Garnet 4 - The Red Queen's Invitation

"I'm concerned," I told Jack as we threaded through the packed hallway toward the cafeteria. The kids who obviously belonged to the Red Court gave me a wide berth. Half the White Court—the half that belonged to Gavin—did, too. But what gave me a funny little glow in my chest was when a few kids sporting black and white outfits gave me tentative smiles and waved at me. I grinned at them and waved back or nodded, depending on how bad the crush around me was.

So far today, I'd been pretty much left alone. Probably because Gavin was still busy licking his wounds and Lily's people were wondering what I was going to do about them. I was still trying to figure that one out myself. And Geneva's goons weren’t going to possibly tip the outcome of our whacked out Wonderland tea party before it even happened. The Red Queen would kill them. Possibly literally.

"Concerned?" Jack echoed as we made it to the cafeteria door. He held it open for me, which always made me feel weird. I still wasn't used to the whole chivalry thing. It didn't make me feel all weak and wimpy, or like the boys thought I was too pathetic to get my own doors. It actually felt nice. And I'd get the door for them, sometimes, too, and they gave me weird looks, so we were pretty much even.

"Yeah."

"About what?" He asked as we slid into the lunch line.

I drew a deep breath. He was going to like this about as much as a cat liked getting a bath. Exhaling slowly, gathering my courage, I finally said, "About Lily."

To my surprise, he actually smiled. "Thank you," he said, sounding relieved. Um.... "Thank you! Finally you've seen sense. So," my dearg added, suddenly full of good cheer and fun. "When do we kick her out?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Pause. Rewind. Now, what? Kick her out?" I could tell from his expression he fully expected me to do just that. "What crack-acid are you smoking?"

"I... isn't that what you meant?" He asked, frowning. Dark eyes watched me as if I'd transformed into some kind of dangerous, venomous snake. "That wasn't what you meant," he said slowly. "All right. What are you talking about, then?"

"I'm concerned about Lily the person. She seems... depressed."

He blinked. "I'm sorry, but what did you say?"

Oh, brother. "She. Seems. Depressed."

"And I am supposed to, as you say, give a flying rat's buttered carcass because why?"

Oooh, he'd stolen my phrase. Sneaky, smexy phrase-thief. I'd get him back for that—after we addressed the Lily situation. "Look, I know you guys hate each other but—"

"I don't hate her," Jack replied, as if commenting on the weather. A double-take was necessary because at first glance he seemed perfectly serene. Only the sizzle of black fury through our bondline—the magical doohickey that connected my soul and emotions to his, and vice-versa—told me differently.

"You don't?" Why did I not believe him? Hmmm…gee, I wonder.

Jack gave a shrug, a liquid motion as if his limbs weren't attached the way normal people's were. "Of course not. Don't be absurd."

He'd just called me "absurd." Part of me wanted to make sure his limbs were no longer attached the way a normal person's were…but I loved him too much. Dang it.

"I just want her ripped into a million painful and incredibly bloody pieces so I can sprinkle her on my porridge most mornings." He said it the way most people said they liked milk with their cereal.

Sometimes Jack would make a comment, or smile in such a way that I was forcibly reminded that he wasn't human. It was easy to forget sometimes that he was Fayre, an old and almost completely alien race. Did that scare me? I'd say it made me a tad nervous, but scared? Me? Of Jack? Please. Besides, after everything he'd been through—being forced to do all kinds of horrible things because of the former soul-contract between him and Lily, serving as one of the main punching bags for Lily's entire family, and almost being molested by Gia Whitmoor, Lily's psychotic b-with-an-itch of a so-called mother—he had a right to the creep-edge that sometimes showed up in his behavior.

"Jack, as long as she lives at my house, I don't want her suicidal or depressed or anything like that." I snagged a couple bags of chips and dropped them onto my tray. I'd been informed by Fiver, my favorite flesh-eating Bunny Wabbit, that bringing my own lunch to this meeting would be considered incredibly rude, so I was stuck with cafeteria food on a day lacking pizza or tatertots. Which meant I was stuck with chips and maybe a chicken burger. All for the cause, though. Rah-rah and Team Spirit and all that stuff.

"I don't see why you worry about someone like her. She's not a threat anymore."

"What if she decides to blow us up or put anthrax in our morning orange juice?" I paused, considered. "Does anthrax even work that way? What does anthrax even do?"

"I'm sure I don't know anything about anthrax," Jack said in the slightly condescending tone boys used when they thought girls were talking nonsense. "And if you're that concerned about her, why don't you throw her out?"

I glared at him as I grabbed the chocolate milk. Maybe I was just a touch on the paranoid side, but it seemed really strange that there wasn't any regular milk out. Just chocolate and strawberry. Black and red. Well, brown and pink, but still…was that weird?

I knew what was weird—me, defending the White Queen to Jack. Except with the Julie thing, he'd never actively opposed me on anything important. And it turned out he'd been right to be suspicious of Julie Frost, the Queen of Spades. She'd been a spy sent by Lily to get close to me so she could seriously injure and/or kill me. But we'd become best friends instead, and Julie had died saving me from Doreen when the Red Court witch—basically acting on Lily's orders—had tried to throw me down two flights of stairs.

David Jacobson, Julie's former Knave of Spades, was not invited to this meeting. Captain of the swim team, topping off at almost seven feet tall and weighing in at more than two-hundred-fifty pounds, the wereotter wanted Doreen's head on a plate. He'd known and loved Julie almost his entire life. Of course, he also wanted Lily dead for forcing Jack to kill David's little brother.

But David was willing to abide my new rules…for now. Having to tack on for-now at the end of that made me just a little bit nervous. Okay, more like a lot nervous.

It was giving me a headache that Jack, who normally backed me up, chose to argue with me about this, especially right now. "Where is she supposed to go?"

He slashed me with an obsidian look. "Try 'I don't care.'"

He wasn't getting it. He might not care, but I did. Wasn't his job as my King supposed to be helping me run my Court? I certainly didn't want him for hired muscle. Patching him up always made it difficult to breathe, seeing how he was both bleeding and usually shirtless.

"It's my fault she can't go home—" I began.

"No, Alyssa, it isn't."

Jack stopped suddenly and whirled on me. His eyes began to bleach to white and his teeth started darkening. People behind us hissed insults or snapped for us to hurry it up, stop holding up the line. Jack flicked his inhuman eyes at them, and they fell silent. Only someone suicidal tried to tangle with a dearg when his teeth came out.

My very ticked off dearg growled, "It's not your fault. It's Lily's fault. Lily is the one who tortured the people who should have been able to trust her. Lily is the one who attacked you, repeatedly, in an attempt to make you give up and either bow down to her or kill yourself. Lily is the one who sent a spy into our midst. Lily is the one who ordered the hit on you and Julie, and Lily is the one who's responsible for her own actions."

None of which I could argue with. But Lily was caught in the system, too, just like the rest of them. It seemed I was the only who had a problem with the actual system, not just the people in it. Then there was her dad. I'd never tangled with an adult before, but I wanted to tangle with Lily's dad, who thought it was okay to beat Jack and Lily whenever either of them made him mad. And there was something I didn't think Jack had thought of yet.

"If you thought you were going to lose me—if you thought I was going to leave you—what would you do?" I asked softly.

"I...." He blinked, paused. His eyes were slowly darkening to onyx again. His teeth gleamed pearly white and had gone back to being nice and straight and even, instead of needle-thin and pointy. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Just answer the question." Although I was positive I already knew the answer.

He frowned. "I don't know."

"Would you let it happen?" I demanded. This part was important, and I couldn't afford to give an inch. I'd had theories about Lily and Geneva—a lot of theories—and this past week or so of having the White Queen sleeping on my floor and getting on my nerves had solidified some of them. "Would you just let me traipse off into the sunset with Darren? Or even—blech—with Fiver?"

At Darren's name, Jack's eyes flashed and he jerked away from me, went back to sliding through the lunch line. I winced. Darren was a big button for Jack that I didn't like pushing, since Darren had made it very obvious he wanted to replace Jack as both my King and my boyfriend (not happening), but it was a valid question.

"No," he growled as the lunch lady rang up the stuff on our trays posing as food. "What does that have to do with this?"

"Would you attack Darren or Fiver to get me to stay with you? To get them out of the way? Would you do anything to me? Would you hurt me? Hurt them? Hurt anyone?"

Indecision warred on his face, in his eyes, arced along our bondline like electricity. He stepped out of line, away from me, to give himself time to compose, to think. But he couldn't decide. I could feel that. He couldn't decide whether he'd attack or hurt someone just to keep me around.

With most guys, especially all the human ones, that would normally be the behavior of a stalker. But this was different. Jack loved me, but that was only part of his motivation. He needed me, just as much as he loved me. His parents didn’t care about him. They'd let Lily's family rip him to pieces again and again. There was special niche in Parent Hell for Jack's mom and dad. He didn’t have any siblings. Except for Lily, until we'd bonded he hadn't had anybody. So I got why he'd hurt someone to be with me, to keep me with him.

Plus, without me, he would probably die. He'd be tortured by the White Court or the Red, they would break him, and then they'd kill him. There would be nothing to stand between him and the pain if I left him, because I was the one who was supposed to protect him. The only one who could. The only one who would even try. And the only person who would bust down doors, knock out teeth, and put people in the hospital if I had to in order to keep him safe.

It had taken me a while to realize that Jack had been the only one who could or would willingly protect Lily from anyone. She had needed him just as much as he needed me. Now she didn't have him. She was alone.

I remembered the voice screaming, Please! Don't leave me! Please, don't leave me alone! The day I'd shattered the soul-contract—and the soulbond—between Jack and Lily, I'd heard that frantic, desperate scream echoing through the Void.

Lily's voice, Lily's fear, Lily's need.

Obsession? No. Necessity. And a bond there, too—she loved him. I was the only one who could see it, because I was the only one who didn't think of Lily as the Big Bad Whatever, the Head Honcho of the Evil Department. In her own messed up way, the White Queen had loved—still loved—Jack. It was why she had held onto him, with chains of magic and chains of sparkly enchanted witch-iron or whatever. Punished him for, in her eyes, straying.

Would Jack do the same for me? To me? No, but that was because he knew I wouldn't leave. He trusted me. He wouldn't have bonded with me, thrown in his support to me, if he didn't trust me. After everything that had happened to him, he was too cautious to gamble with his life. I'd had to earn his trust first. That was the only reason he wouldn't hurt me.

But the others?

I hadn't looked away from his eyes, twin pools of obsidian fire, while he struggled for an answer. He opened his mouth as decision suddenly hummed across the bondline.

"I—"

"It's show time, you guys," Harriet Marshal interrupted. Another Faerie, Harriet was something called a Sluagh—basically a type of Faerie vampire, but instead of fangs, she had teeth like shards of broken glass, and her eyes glowed aquamarine when she got ticked off. She'd glided silently up to us and neither of us had noticed, because she was just that epic. The moment she spoke I jumped. "Hattie and Doreen are waiting...nice shirt, Alyssa."

Grateful for the interruption, I glanced down at myself and smiled. I'd borrowed one of Jack's only black shirts—nine-thousand thread-count Egyptian cotton or something like that; whatever, it was expensive and pretty—and wore it like a jacket over a white silk shirt with a black fractal pattern spattered across it like dark blood. Nobody had had a chance to get a good look at it yet except Jack, who'd winced when he saw I wore white. I thought it was nice and symbolic and stuff—black over white, and of course black comes out on top, just like it did at Homecoming.

And they all thought I sucked at diplomatically sending a message. Silly, silly Faerie people.

"Darren's waiting by the table, to show good faith," Harriet added, shooting a nervous look at Jack. His jaw muscle twitched. Oh, brother. Harriet was bonded to Darren, and I was pretty sure she loved him. Maybe not in love with him, but I could tell she adored the guy. Considering how he treated her—as opposed to how he always hit on me like a sex-crazed schmucky horn-dog—I understood why. And she liked Jack a lot. Jack liked her. But Jack hated Darren (for obvious reasons) and still didn’t fully trust him not to hurt me.

Considering Darren was one of only three people I knew who knew the big bad secret of me being not just a demon, but the Alice from Lewis Carroll's coded prophecies—the other two being Jack, of course, and Fiver, who could read minds—and Darren hadn’t ratted me out yet, I had to admit I trusted him. And I liked him…when he wasn’t being a douche.

Ignoring the silent byplay between Jack and Harriet, I headed for the lunch table where the Lady Dormouse—aka Doreen Moss, Darren's twin sister—and Geneva's Mad Hattie waited for me. Talk about a mad tea party. What was next, croquet at the Queen's?

Cold, dark eyes slid up from the table to stare at me as I sank onto the bench, flanked by Harriet and Jack. Darren, with a weird smile, sat next to Harriet. Doreen, the owner of those chilling eyes, glared at her twin brother before turning to Hattie Marshal.

Hattie Marshal looked better than she had after the Homecoming battle in the school parking lot, but that wasn't saying much. The giant gaping chunk that Jack had bitten out of her that night still hadn't grown back completely, and the lopsided way her shirt and jacket hung on her told me just how much bandage she wore on her shoulder. Bruises painted a violent watercolor across her face. Still, I didn’t feel too bad. She'd been trying to kill Jack.

"Greetings, Black Queen," Doreen said after a long pause. She glanced at Hattie again, but the look on the Sluagh girl's face made even a whacko like Doreen nervous enough not to push for her to be chatty-chatty and polite. Hattie was the kind of person who would ask in normal conversation if you wanted to know what your spleen looked like in the light of day, and be completely serious.

"Greetings to the emissaries of the Red Court," Darren said in his smoothest, silkiest voice. Hattie flushed and Doreen glowered. Considering that, in their eyes, he'd stolen Hattie's twin sister to be his brainwashed slave—Love slave? Ew, don't think like that, Alyssa, yech!—and was a traitor to the Red Court, their reactions were understandable. But if it came down to a fight against Geneva's Mad Hattie, I wanted someone physically stronger than her who was also immune to magic and could take Doreen in a one-on-one fight, leaving Jack and Harriet free to deal with Hattie. The only person I knew who fit the bill was Darren.

"Looks like we're all here," said bill-fitter continued, "the Hatter, the Hare, both Dormice, and Alyssa."

"And the Black Jack," Hattie growled through peeled-back, black-painted lips, showing serrated teeth like shards of silvered glass. Her eyes glinted like ancient gold coins, but they weren’t glowing yet. Hunger burned in their depths.

Hattie was Sluagh, too, descended from the Faerie Wild Hunt—those magical creatures who randomly chased after anyone in their path. If the person ran, they were torn to bloody bits by Faerie hounds. If the person didn't run—and who wouldn't run from an army of sweaty, hairy, toothy Faerie guys on horseback with crossbows and swords and ravening, salivating, man-flesh-desiring demon-poodles?—then they were made part of the Hunt, and cursed for their courage (see suicidal tendencies) to ride through the skies forever or until they chose to hop down off the Faerie Ponies of Doom and die. Sounded kind of like a Johnny Cash song, actually, except without the awesome, croony cowboy voice.

Because Hattie was one of them, she craved blood the way crack addicts craved their drugs. It wasn't like actual nosferatu vampires (which didn't exist, apparently), where they fed on the blood of the living to survive. If the Sluagh didn't eat regular food and drink regular water or whatever, they'd die even if they had blood. But that didn't stop Hattie Marshal from craving Jack's blood like a meth-head craved crystal crack. They'd always been rivals. I didn't get that, but I wasn't a blood junkie or a psycho, so obviously I didn’t get to join the club. Not that I wanted to.

"And the King is here, too, of course," Darren said, as if he didn't see the glint of raw bloodlust and hatred in Hattie's eyes or, if he did, didn't care. Harriet kept a wary eye on her sister, but Darren merely shot Jack a look before saying, "So—down to business."

§

"So now that we're all here, what do you want, exactly?" My Queen demanded, propping her elbows on the table. A casual observer would think she didn't take this meeting seriously, but the fact that she was dressed up told me otherwise. I wondered what she might get from this conversation that the rest of us would miss. She had such a unique way of looking at things.

I wasn't worried about how she'd handle herself. What worried me was Darren, and the fact that she'd brought him along with us in the first place. I understood her reasoning, I did. But Darren could not be trusted. He'd already made it clear he was after something other than Alyssa's wellbeing. Whatever it was—and I doubted it was just her body, though the fact that he wanted that as well made me want to rip his appendix out—I wouldn't let him have it.

However, I could appreciate the spit-in-the-eye symbolism of bringing Darren to a meeting with Doreen. The only two people Doreen had ever lost a fight to were her twin brother and Alyssa. A narcissist to the core, no doubt that rankled her quite a bit.

"How about we eat first?" Doreen replied to Alyssa's prompting, with all the manners of a society hostess. A muscle in her cheek twitched when she began almost spastically rearranging the plastic-ware around her lunch tray. No doubt she was imagining carving Alyssa up with the shards of her plastic knife and fork. Doreen liked cutting things up.

"I can never eat when I'm excited," my Queen replied with chilly politeness. "Let's cut to the chase. Why did you set up this meeting with us?"

"We're here to offer an invitation, nothing more," Doreen said. Hattie said nothing, just watched me with half-mad eyes.

"An invitation to what, pray tell?" Darren asked his sister.

"Geneva is hosting a tea social two weeks from now. Until that time, we propose a ceasefire between the Black and Red Courts. We can't make promises for Gavin Whitmoor and his people, obviously, but for our part, no violence. In exchange, you agree to come to the aforementioned tea social."

"I don't even know what a tea social is," Alyssa replied.

Hattie finally tore her gaze away from my face to stare at Alyssa with a WTF expression on her face. "It's a fancy word for tea party, all right? Humans are so stupid."

"Geneva wants me to come to her tea party?"

Doreen nodded. "Precisely."

"Not to be rude or anything, but uh…why?"

"She doesn't want bloodshed. She doesn't want a battle like the one you had with Lily. She certainly doesn't want a war."

"Meaning she doesn't want to get her ass kicked and lose the right to try for the Garnet Crown," Darren interjected.

"Wait, what?" Alyssa stared from Darren to Doreen, who glared at her twin as if she would cheerfully claw his eyes out with her bare hands. Darren just offered his sister that bland "oops" smile that made most of the guys in the senior class want to deck him. I could actually appreciate it, though, since it made Doreen grind her teeth.

"Can't you ever keep your mouth shut, warlock?" Hattie snarled. She started to lunge to her feet, but Harriet and I both stood up before she'd finished moving. Alyssa propped her chin on her hand and looked bored, but I felt her fury sizzle along our bondline, hot enough to burn. She wouldn’t go out of her way to attack Hattie or Doreen, but if they attacked someone she cared about—including Darren, unfortunately—she would come down on them like an avalanche. Considering she'd nearly beaten Lily to death in a fit of rage at Homecoming, neither Doreen nor Hattie wanted to deal with enraging the Black Queen that much.

"It's not my problem if the Red Queen is a coward," Darren replied airily.

Doreen leapt to her feet this time, eyes blazing, reaching with one hand for Darren. "How dare you—"

"Okay, everyone shut up!" Alyssa suddenly yelled, and the cafeteria fell silent. She eyed the rest of the room, baffled, before turning back to Doreen and Darren. "Jeez! What is this, kindergarten? Do I have to make the quiet sign? Now no more name calling or someone's gonna end up in time-out."

"Don't you dare mock me, human," Doreen snarled.

Alyssa folded her arms. "I'll mock you if I want to, if you decide it's socially acceptable to act like the last fourteen years of your life never happened and you don't know how to behave. What are you, two? Act like a teenager and I'll treat you like one."

"How do you put up with her, Darren?" The warlock's sister demanded. Indignation spread across her face like a disease. "I know you have sick tastes, but seriously!"

Alyssa stiffened. I tasted rot on the back of my tongue and knew I was in danger of going dearg in the middle of lunch if someone didn’t do something to make Doreen stop talking. Rumors like that, of the Black Queen bypassing her King for the Black Knight—especially when that Knight was Darren Moss, demon-possessed warlock—were dangerous on a good day.

"Well, it's so nice to see the children can behave themselves without adult supervision," a familiar voice said behind me. I turned to see Fiver Rairah approach the table and take a seat next to me, sandwiching me between the ash-blond dearg and my queen. "Doreen, I had no idea you had such a twisted, depraved mind."

Alyssa smiled. "Yes, you did."

"Hmmm, you're right, my Queen. I did. Now, Doreen, you asked how we put up with Lady Alyssa? I will admit, she may be a bit eccentric, but at least she's not…what do you call them, my Queen? Homicide Barbie?"

Alyssa shot him a look that plainly ordered him to behave. To my surprise, he subsided, smiling. Then I realized—we were in public. Of course he was going to act as if he obeyed her every whim. In reality, he drove her crazy. Strangely, she seemed to find that comforting.

Darren grinned. Alyssa suddenly stiffened again beside me.

§

Something touched my thigh, and I froze. I glanced under the table and realized it was Darren's hand, stretched across Harriet's petite figure. The scheming warlock replied, "The benefits of being bonded to the Black Queen far outweigh the negative aspects."

"You better get your hand off my thigh or I'll demonstrate some negative aspects," I growled, and jabbed his forearm with the prongs of my plastic fork. He barely stifled a yelp and jerked back from me. Turning to Hattie and Doreen as if nothing weird had happened—and considering this was Darren we were talking about, nothing weird really had—I said, "Tell Geneva she'll have my answer in a few days. I have to talk it over with my Court."

"The sign of a weak Queen," Hattie muttered. Oh, well now she was hurting my widdle-bitty feelings. Boo. "Why not simply order them to obey you?"

"Because they might have valid reasons why I shouldn't go, like the fact that you're all certifiably crazy. Or that this might be some kind of trap. In which case I'd have to go all gung-ho on your butts and beat you into turkey stuffing before sashaying off into the sunset like the epic ninja I am."

"A Queen should have absolute control over her Court," Hattie spat.

I snorted. "Yeah, we saw how well that worked with Lily."

"Lily Whitmoor is weak."

I couldn't help it—I smirked. Maybe it wasn’t politically savvy, but I couldn't help myself. "I didn't see your Queen stepping up to the plate at Homecoming. She just stood there with her cutesy-wootsy widdle crown on her head, doing the Beauty Queen wave. We were all very impressed." I nodded with a mock-amazed expression on my face. Of course Doreen leaned forward, eyes blazing, teeth bared. Honestly, she looked like a rabid spider-monkey.

"I ought to rip your face off," she hissed.

Jerking my chin at the crimson blouse she had on—normally she didn’t wear ruffles; must've been the occasion—I said, "You'd get blood on that nice, silk shirt. If you're anything like Darren, that would make you really unhappy."

For a second I saw something flicker in her eyes. She glanced at her brother, then looked back at me. Her expression turned mean again. "I'm nothing like Darren."

Darren glanced at me. I raised my eyebrows. He smiled politely and said to the Red Court girls, "I take it this means we're done, then?"

Hattie and Doreen rose to their feet, matching looks of disdain on their faces. That was the problem with mean girls—they would've been knockouts if they didn’t insist on twisting up their faces like angsty pretzels all the time. Hattie said coldly, "Four days, Black Queen. Geneva will have your answer after school, this Friday."

"Fine." I waved at them. "Now go away. I'm hungry."

They left. I looked at Harriet, at Darren the Schmoozer, at my favorite albino Bunny Wabbit, then at Jack. They all looked relieved more than anything. I felt great. I'd gotten through my first political meeting and nobody had died. Go, me.

Now if only I had some tatertots…

Once 105 ending scene revamped

Bitter wintry wind tried and failed to cut through Dylan's fur-lined cloak as she and Nuada stepped into the main palace courtyard. The supply-wagons were already laden and had begun the slow process of heading out of the Elven stronghold through the tall, elegantly sculpted, faerie-metal gates. Three carriages—of golden wood and faerie metal, draped with crimson, and the Bethmooran crest of the Eildon Tree carved and inlaid with gold on the doors—waited for Dylan, her siblings, her hounds, and the cubs to go inside them. Everyone else would be on horseback.

The prince, Dylan, and their retinue approached the horses the stable-hands held in readiness in the middle of the courtyard, several paces from the carriages. While the Butcher Guards and the small company of Elven guards mounted the tall, shaggy, coal-black phookas that looked like Clydesdales (more phookas pulled the carriages), Wink helped Lorelei mount a horse with a sleek, ivory coat…and two horns protruding from its disproportionately wide head—horns as black as ebony, as long Dylan's arm, and as sharp as spears. Dylan's jaw went slack when she saw the rhinemaiden's mount. Her mouth fell open even wider when she saw the huge thing Wink was going to ride.

It looked like a bull, its hide shifting in shades of black, crimson, and amber like coals. Its horns and the fangs it bared seemed to glow like molten bronze. It stood taller than Dylan at the shoulder, with a body wider than the breadth of Nuada's shoulders, and a cow-tail that ended in a small, sullen flame. It bore a saddle of soot-stained leather and a bronze-chain bridle. Wink hoisted himself atop its back with ease. The creature pawed the steaming slush under its bronze hoof; its impatient snort made the air shimmer with impossible heat.

"Lorelei rides an indrik," Nuada said in Dylan's ear. His breath warmed her cold ears. "His name is Sergei."

"What's an indrik?"

"A beast from Zwezda, a sort of horse-bull hybrid in human terms. Notice the hooves." He pointed at the cloven ebony hooves of Lorelei's steed. "They're razor sharp. You do not want an indrik to kick you."

"What's that?" Dylan pointed to Wink's beast. Even at a dozen paces away, it gave off an odd sort of heat. The snow around it had melted to slush, but the grooms in charge of the creature seemed to be able to touch it without harm.

"A bonnacon," Nuada replied. "From the wild forests of Eathesbury. Another horse-bull hybrid. They're wonderfully warm—pleasant mounts in cold weather. They can be a bit wild, but I hand-raised that stallion from a foal. He's as gentle as a lamb with those he's fond of. He'll like you, never fear. Bonnacons have the intelligence of small children, and they understand speech, though they cannot speak themselves. I've already told him who you are. And this," he added with a wealth of pride in his voice, "is Maeve."

A white mare stepped away from the group of fae horses and approached Dylan and Nuada shyly. Her eyes gleamed like emeralds, and the firelight caught in the silky banners of her pearlescent celadon mane and tail. Lòman, Nuada's black stallion, came to stand beside the mare. The stallion nuzzled her shoulder before bowing his head. Maeve bowed her own head.

*My lady, I am Maeve,* the mare said in the voice of a woman close to Dylan's age. *I am an arion mare, and I am honored to bear you for part of this journey.*

Dylan's mouth started to fall open again, but then she remembered that arions—fae horses with green manes and tails, native to Mytikas and Shahbaz—could speak the same way Nuada's wolfhounds could. She smiled at the mare. "It's nice to meet you. I'm not a great rider, but I'll try to sit up straight and pretend I know what I'm doing when it's time to hop in the saddle." For safety reasons, Nuada wanted her mostly in a carriage, but she'd be on horseback when it was time to approach the first of the villages, so the people wouldn’t automatically think she was some pampered, cosseted gold-digger.

Maeve whickered, the horse-version of a laugh. *Thank you, milady.* The mare gently touched her nose to Dylan's shoulder. *We will be friends, I think.*

"I'd like that."

"A'ge'lv! A'ge'lv! Look at the ponies!" The enraptured shout dragged Dylan's gaze over to 'Sa'ti standing beside a sable pony, its mane and tail such a dark black they carried blue and green tints, like midnight water. The ends of both mane and tail dripped water on the snow. Jet-black eyes gleamed and the pony tossed its head. A'du stroked the neck of an identical pony, standing next to his sister. Tsu's'di rode a horse with the same coloring.

Glashtyn, Dylan thought, Eathesburian water-horses and water-ponies malevolent to humans but friendly to the Fair Folk. She knew Nuada had dozens upon dozens in his stables. He loved horses of any kind. And she knew Nuada would've made certain everyone's mounts were safe before arranging for them to accompany them on this trip. Dylan waved her servants over and said goodbye to Maeve before allowing Nuada to help her into the carriage.

Unlike the replicas of medieval human carriages Dylan had seen, this one was actually quite roomy. The inside was golden wood paneling, the benches padded with scarlet velvet cushions. Four amber fairy-lights glowed in each corner of the ceiling. Shelves on the front and back walls above the seats held blankets and a few packs that Dylan knew concealed a few books—mostly for the children— and snacks for the trip; Nuada no doubt planned to stop and make a small camp for lunch so that everyone could stretch their legs and relieve themselves around midday.

A'du and 'Sa'ti sat on the bench opposite Dylan and peered expectantly out the window while everyone else got ready. Dylan's siblings all climbed into the second of the three carriages. The third was a decoy; they were headed into what basically amounted to a warzone. Erik Ashkeson, the dökkálfar who would accompany them as part of Nuada's guard—just as Lorelei had agreed to come in order to protect Dylan and, to a lesser degree, Francesca, since the rhinemaiden and the mortal waitress had a friend in common—Erik mounted a wülfsvað, a shaggy black horse from Álfheim, with a wolf's head and sharp, stone hooves. Packs and saddlebags had been stowed where they belonged.

Everyone was ready.

Nuada turned toward the main doors of the castle and saw his father, bundled up in velvets and furs against the bitter cold and the dark, coming down the steps with Nuala and Naya behind him…and Bres. The Fomorian prince escorted the princess down the icy stone steps, and continued to hold Nuala's hand and gazed at her with obvious tenderness when they reached the ground. Another pang sliced through Nuada's heart when he saw his sister gaze back with equal adoration. Nuala would never forgive him for breaking her engagement.

But he put that out of his mind as his father, sister, and friend approached. Bres strode beside them, and when they reached the crown prince, Balor nodded to the Fomorian. Nuada frowned, tension singing through his shoulders, but said nothing. Bres cleared his throat.

"Luck be with you on your journey, my friend," he said, and he sounded as if he meant it. But then, Bres loved the Fair Folk. He was loyal to them and no doubt considered what Nuada intended to do to be a less shameful thing than what Bres assumed Nuada currently occupied his time with—enjoying the dubious pleasure of a mortal in his bed. Nuada inclined his head in taciturn acknowledgment. Bres added, "I would like to speak with your lady for a moment, if I may."

The Tuathan prince opened his mouth to snap no when Dylan's voice broke through the cold night. "I would like to speak to Prince Bres, if it pleases you, Your Highness."

He shot her a sharp look. Leaning out the carriage window, she met his look with cool equanimity, a silent plea to please trust her. After a moment, he inclined his head to her, then looked back at Bres. He felt his eyes shift to icy topaz tinged with the faintest hint of copper fury. "As my lady wishes."

Bres nodded to him and moved past, toward Dylan. Immediately everything in Nuada's body tightened in protest. Unease churned in his belly, but he forced it down. Dylan wouldn’t have asked to speak to Bres if it wasn’t safe. And what could he do, with her guards so close? In front of Balor, whom the Fomorian heir wished to impress? Nuada tried to force himself to relax as he turned back to his father and sister.

Nuala threw her arms around him. He stiffened in surprise, then relaxed into the embrace. She kissed his cheek. Whispered through their link, May the gods watch over you, Brother. Be careful. Come home to us.

Have no fear, little sister. I will be all right, and I will make our father proud.

Áthair is already proud of you, Nuada.

It seemed, as the prince turned to his father, that his sister was right. Balor set both hands on Nuada's shoulders and smiled. His father yet looked tired. Nuada pushed aside the worry slithering through his skull. Balor seemed to grow wearier and wearier as time went on; he looked almost ill. Dylan had said she thought he might be unwell.

The Elven warrior wished he could stay to look after the king, but his people needed him. He simply couldn't. So he forced a smile to his lips for his father's sake and nodded to him. "Áthair."

"My son, be well on your journey." A wry twist came into Balor's smile. "I trust I needn't tell you to look after your lady; I know that you will. And she is one who can take care of herself…for the most part. When you return, we will speak further about many things. You will of course be back in time for the Frost Moon."

Nuada grinned. "Of course, Father. It would be poor form indeed for me to miss my own wedding. We should be back well before then. And if not, Arawn has promised to send the Chariot of Annwn to fetch us home again in time for everything."

Balor nodded and clapped his son on the shoulder. "Good. It will do the people good to see and hear of your lady before your wedding. You have my blessing to travel through the royal forest, using the army roads."

The prince blinked. The army roads were enchanted, and could only be walked with the king's permission. It would take a day, perhaps two, to get nearly anywhere in the kingdom, even if the trip would've normally taken a week or more. The spells laid into the royal forest and the army roads had saturated trees and earth, brush and stone since before Balor's grandfather's grandfather's time. None knew who had laid them; the unicorns, perhaps—dozens of unicorn glories had made their homes in the royal forest since time out of mind, and gave aid to the kings of Bethmoora in exchange for royal protection from hunters, human and fae. It was a sickening and heinous crime, worthy of execution-by-slow-torture, to kill a unicorn in any fae kingdom. Travel through the royal forest was permitted rarely, and usually only in times of crisis. If the king was giving it to him now…

"Thank you, Áthair," Nuada murmured.

The sound of a door opening briefly distracted him, and he turned to see a few of the kitchen staff coming out with food wrapped in cloths to keep the heat in. They moved toward the mounted group, dispersing breakfast. Nuada noticed a kitchen maid with a gaze reflecting the moonlight like eyeshine and hair like deer's hide go directly to a grinning Tsu's'di—Isibéal ingen Cabhán. Tsu's'di leaned down and began murmuring to her. Nuada smiled and turned back to his father.

"We must go now."

"Fare thee well, Prince of Bethmoora," Balor said softly, squeezing his son's shoulder one last time.

"Fare thee well, Majesty," Nuada murmured, bowing his head. He hesitated for the briefest instant, then embraced his father. Balor hugged him tightly, as he had only done once in the last twenty centuries, two days past on Christmas morning.

His father's voice sounded old and worn when he whispered, "Please be careful, my son. Stay safe."

"I shall do my best."

Before Nuada could go back to the mounted group, Polunochnaya stepped forward and hugged him as his sister had. "Be safe, my friend," she whispered. "Come home soon. The castle is dull without you here to stir up trouble."

Nuada chuckled, but he eyed the Zwezdan noblewoman with some concern. She sounded…forlorn. Her cat-slit silver eyes seemed shadowed. Why? He frowned, catching her gaze. She bit her lip, opened her mouth as if she would speak. Closed it again. Shook her head, dropping her gaze. Nuada murmured, "Naya?"

"It's nothing," she murmured, swiping at her hair. "Just…please. Take care. Will you promise me?"

Brows furrowing, Nuada asked sotto voce, "What's wrong, Naya?"

She shook her head again. "Nothing, as I said. Just be careful."

"Of course," the prince replied, and Polunochnaya offered him a tremulous smile. "I shall see you and my sister very soon. You've nothing to worry over. Be well, milady."

And then it was time for him to step away, to go to Lòman and mount up. Bres had already stepped back from Dylan and was now eyeing her as if he couldn’t quite understand what he was looking at. To his surprise, Dylan offered the Fomorian prince a tight smile and inclined her head. What surprised Nuada even more was when Bres canted his head back before returning to Nuala's side. Nuada shot Dylan a look that plainly asked, What was that about?

Dylan smiled and shook her head, as if to say, I'll tell you later.

Urging Lòman to ride beside Dylan's carriage, once side by side the arion stallion and the royal carriage moved to the head of the group. The last of the wagons had just left the castle grounds. Now it was their turn. Once they cleared the outer walls of the palace, they'd head up to the front of the supply-train. Nuada caught Dylan's eye and nodded his head, asking silently if she was ready. She nodded.

"Look for us in the week ere the Frost Moon," Nuada called over his shoulder.

A click of his tongue urged Lòman into a slow trot. The coachman followed suit, coaxing the phookas to match the prince's pace. The others fell in line behind them: Dylan's siblings' carriage behind the prince and the carriage carrying his lady; Tsu's'di as close to Dylan's carriage as possible; Wink, Lorelei, and Erik near them; and the Butcher Guards, minus young Guardsman Loén, behind them. Loén rode next to Tsu's'di; having lost his partner Siothrún to the dungeons because of Siothrún's treason, Loén was now partnered with Tsu's'di at Dylan's request, as the two were relatively close in age and got along well.

The prince glanced back only once, to ensure everyone was in place. He noticed Tsu's'di, A'du', and 'Sa'ti looking back as well. He frowned, then noticed a sleepy-looking kitchen boy waving and calling goodbye to the children. The ewah cubs leaned out the carriage window and waved, calling, "Bye, Rórdán! Bye!"

And Tsu's'di looked back at Isibéal, who stood with her arms folded beside Rórdán, one loose fist held to her heart. Tsu's'di raised a hand in a wave of farewell. Taking a single step, Isibéal blew him a kiss. The cougar youth pretended to catch it, holding it to his chest. Nuada bit back a grin and faced forward again. Dylan caught his eye above the cubs' head and smiled before blowing him a kiss of her own. Nuada let his grin show through when he caught it and pressed it to his heart.

"After the township, we make for the royal forest," he commanded. They were on their way at last.

"Unicorns," Dylan murmured, smiling in fond memory of their single night in the forest when he had brought her to see the glory. Nuada winked. She bit her lip and grinned.

Yes. If he could manage it, if they would come near with her kin and the Butcher Guards with them, he would take her to see the unicorns again.

What's New in January, Kazoo?

Hey, what's new, kazoo?

So because I've been sick (and busy editing I Hear the Bones Singing as well as working on a few new projects—I'm branching out, genre-wise, experimenting with all kinds of things like steampunk, science fiction, historical, and even middle-grade) I haven’t had a lot of time to do a lot of reviews. I've only got, like, five or so. But you should still check them out. They span a wide range of genres, including one children's picture book about zombies! I saw it at the library mixed in with all the Valentine's Day books and thought, "I have got to grab that." And I've got a few essays and/or advice blogs you guys should look at, too. 

Coraline—Neil Gaiman

The Darkness After—Scott B. Williams

Entwined—Heather Dixon

Glitch—HeatherAnastasiu

Splintered—AGHoward (I love AG Howard)

Zombie in Love—Kate DiPucchino

 

Glitch - Heather Anastasiu

In the Community, there is no more pain or war. Implanted computer chips have wiped humanity clean of destructive emotions, and thoughts are replaced by a feed from the Link network.

When Zoe starts to malfunction (or “glitch”), she suddenly begins having her own thoughts, feelings, and identity. Any anomalies must be immediately reported and repaired, but Zoe has a secret so dark it will mean certain deactivation if she is caught: her glitches have given her uncontrollable telekinetic powers.

As Zoe struggles to control her abilities and stay hidden, she meets other glitchers including Max, who can disguise his appearance, and Adrien, who has visions of the future. Both boys introduce Zoe to feelings that are entirely new. Together, this growing band of glitchers must find a way to free themselves from the controlling hands of the Community before they’re caught and deactivated, or worse.

In this action-packed debut, Glitch begins an exciting new young adult trilogy.

So I'm a big fan of the "punk" genres—steampunk especially (and clockpunk as its main subgenre), mythpunk, cyberpunk, biopunk, elfpunk. I love them all. Especially steampunk, as I said, because of the cool weapons and armor and stuff people can come up with for their work (gotta say, I don't like The Girl in the Steel Corset, for so many reasons, but the actual steel corset is pretty cool). And steampunk is super popular right now, so I always get a little thrill when I see cyber- or bio-punk.

So imagine my little happy dance when I saw Glitch by Heather Anastasiu at the library. It's one of those cyber-punk stories with people having microchips and stuff implanted in their bodies and being hooked up mentally to the internet and whatnot. I love those. I love me some technology, but I also love reading about how technology could come back and bite us all in the butt. So I cracked open Glitch with happiness and good feelings.

To quote Marlin from Pixar's Finding Nemo, "Good feeling's gone."

I understand that the main character, Zoel (pretty name, gotta give props) is hooked into the Link—aka the Internet—and for the most part exists in this gray, emotionless fog. I get that. But the book begins with Zoel glitching, losing contact with the Link, and experiencing real emotions…only it really doesn’t feel like it. It feels blank and dull, empty.

This review is going to be short because only one thing is really wrong with the book. The plot is interesting (as I said, love me some cyberpunk), the characters are sympathetic, the twists are good. Things make sense. It's not the book itself. It's the writing. It's very…it's lackluster. There's no sense of immediacy, no sense of "this is actually happening" in the writing. Zoel is very much the automaton for most of this book, even when she's not Linked. I would've expected, since emotions are suppressed so strongly by the Link, that when she glitched, things would come out stronger, but the monotone of the book never really changed. I'm not sure why (with another book I read, The Darkness After, the problem was a lot of forced telling vs effortless showing) but it just really dragged for me, even though the plot was twisty and complex and cool.

I think the book sold on its brilliant creativity (because it is pretty smart and imaginative) but there wasn’t enough effort put into polishing it up after acceptance. Now, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe other people like it. I'm not saying it's terrible and I'm not trying to insult the author by any means. I think Heather Anastasiu is a very creative person, to mix together psychic ability into a dystopian cyberpunk novel.

And two things I have to compliment her on, that I absolutely love: the book is totally not depressing, when it absolutely could have been, but she gives it just the right amount of levity; and there's no cussing. I don't like cussing strictly for the sake of cussing (like in Nancy Kress's Flash Point so the fact that Ms. Anastasiu doesn't do that wins her BIG points from me. I love the alternative words she uses instead (godlam'd, cracking, shunting). So kudos to her for that. But the book just didn't…didn’t grab me like I was hoping. I found myself unsurprised by anything because it seemed like Zoel wasn’t really experiencing any of the plot twists. I feel bad, but there it is. I just didn’t connect with the story. I connected with Zoel just fine, but not the story. I hate when that happens. It's a rare thing, too, which makes it all the more disappointing.

In conclusion, I give Glitch 2.5/5 stars because the plot and the world really are creative and the thought of being that hooked into the internet and the technological world is kind of creepy (esp. when I see those pictures of kids in a line with their heads bent over their phones, no one looking around at anything…ugh). And the plot twists were pretty unexpected. But I just didn’t…care about the plot. And that makes me sad.

Sincerely,

LA Knight

PS — I must also say this: the cover is absolutely beautiful.

The Darkness After - Scott B. Williams (2 Stars)

TWO TEENAGERS FIGHT TO SURVIVE IN AN AMERICA GONE DARK When massive solar flares send an intense electromagnetic pulse to Earth, every electrical device is fried instantly. The modern world that sixteen-year-old Mitch Henley has always known comes crashing down. Anarchy, looting and chaos explode all around him. Stranded in New Orleans, Mitch escapes into the Mississippi backwoods he knows so well, hoping to stay alive using the survival and hunting skills he learned from his game-warden father.

Alone and on foot, Mitch sets out to make his way back to the family farm and his younger sister. Not knowing if his parents are dead or alive, nothing else matters . . . until he meets April Gibbs along the way. Smart, beautiful, lethal and alone, she is also making a treacherous trek to find her lost family. They decide to travel together for safety, but neither can begin to imagine the danger that awaits them in the woods.

Set in the same anarchy-and-desperation-reigned world of the author’s dystopian thriller: The Pulse, The Darkness After a frightening look at how fragile our technologically dependent lifestyle really is.

So I read a lot of different books, including stuff that I see recommended on blogs or that's recommended by the library. That's where I came across the book The Darkness After. It had a cool looking cover and an interesting premise, and it didn’t look too long (it was less than 300 pages), so I figured, "Hey, why not?"

Ohmigawsh, you guys, this was the book that would not end! I don't what this guy did—injected it with Sloth-Berry Juice or, I dunno, forgot to the existence of contractions, maybe—but this book just dragged on and on and on. I got about a quarter of the way in and wanted to quit, but I didn’t so that I could write about why this book bothered me so much and show all of you guys what not to do with your own work.

Before we continue, I have to say, the book wasn’t bad. The characters were nice people, the premise was pretty interesting, no one did anything that made me hate them who was a good guy (plenty of bad guys, though). The pacing wasn’t bad, either. That wasn’t the problem.

The problem was, it was so dry. It felt like I was reading a textbook. Part of that was the lack of contractions, which can really help give writing a sense of immediacy when you need it. And this book needed it because the book had lots of danger, lots of bad guys and problems and things going totally south, but except for the prologue (which was like, 2 pages) and the first few pages of chapter one, the danger had no immediacy. It was like the book was being read by Ben Stein. I had Ben Stein in my head! Do you know how shudder-worthy that is?

So the biggest problem was dryness. When the characters are being shot at, it's supposed to stir the blood, make the reader gasp and say, "Oh, no!" But it didn't. It was like reading a news report written by a robot. And it wasn’t that I didn’t care about the characters. Mitch and April seem like nice people and I wanted them to reach their goals—Mitch getting to his sister to look after her and April getting to her infant daughter. I really wanted to root for them because I liked them as people, but it was almost like they were telling me, "Yeah, I gotta…like, go rescue my family. It's just a thing real quick. Yeah, I can wait while we have a drink" (heard in one of those monotonous stoner-voices). The writer told me they had these goals, that these goals were important to them…but I wasn’t feeling it.

The second thing: the dialogue was terrible. I have never heard teenagers talk like that (Mitch is fifteen, April is eighteen). And April says things like, "Gosh, I just really feel I have to get to my baby. She is all I can think of right now. I cannot think of anything else. I just want to find my baby and make sure she is all right." Mitch talks like that, too, minus the parts about the baby. But the dialogue is stilted and very adult-like (if the adult were an android). I kept face-palming and making weird expressions that made my husband laugh and my cats look at me funny while I read it.

And the final thing: April regarding her baby. I like that she actually cares about her kid instead of being like, "Oh, well." I do like that. But the author takes it overboard with how he writes it. It's very…if the way April talked about her baby was improve-script for a movie or a play, the director would accuse her of overacting. Not that the bond between mother and child isn't an incredibly strong one, because it totally is. But the way the author wrote it reads fake. It's almost as if he wrote what he assumed mothers were like, but never actually stopped to ask one.

A good example, actually, is this mother duck I saw on Tumblr. She'd popped up onto the curb and half her babies were with her but the other half were stuck on the side of the road on the asphalt. And this guy sees her and grabs a box or something and sets it down next to the curb so the ducklings could hop up there and then get to the curb. And at first the duck is totally losing her mind. She flares her wings and waddles toward him, and if she spoke English instead of Duck she probably would've said, "Get the f*** away from my babies, you sick son of a…" And then she sees he's helping and backs off, like, "Oh. Thank you, kind sir."

I sort of expected April to be like that—like Sarah Connor in Terminator II. And April's had combat training and stuff from her dad, and she can handle herself, so this isn't an unreal expectation, but for the most part, we never see her act on her supposed need to get to her kid. She just talks about it, really. Stuff like I mentioned above, "Oh, I just simply have to get to my baby. I just need to hold her in my arms. She must be so frightened." Most of the times that April reacts like a tigress, it's when she's in serious danger of probably dying, and again, the action sequences lack immediacy, so that's not really that impressive anyway.

All in all, this book's problem was the technical aspect of the writing, not the plot. I don't normally run into that sort of thing. So I'm giving it 2/5 stars, winning the two stars for plot and likeable characters. But I had to practically chew through this book (and I like Tolkien and Shakespeare, so wordage isn't the problem) and I kind of wanted to gouge out my eyes by the time I sat down to write this review. My reward to myself is a cookie—my roommate made them and they're delicious.

Saluting you with my cinnamon-sugar cookie,

LA Knight

Coraline by Neil Gaiman Review (4 Stars)

Coraline's often wondered what's behind the locked door in the drawing room. It reveals only a brick wall when she finally opens it, but when she tries again later, a passageway mysteriously appears. Coraline is surprised to find a flat decorated exactly like her own, but strangely different. And when she finds her "other" parents in this alternate world, they are much more interesting despite their creepy black button eyes. When they make it clear, however, that they want to make her theirs forever, Coraline begins a nightmarish game to rescue her real parents and three children imprisoned in a mirror. With only a bored-through stone and an aloof cat to help, Coraline confronts this harrowing task of escaping these monstrous creatures.

Tim Burton is a movie-making god, just so everyone knows. He's had some movies that sort of missed with me—Pee-Wee's Big Adventure and Sweeny Todd, for instance, but he didn’t come up with the idea for Sweeny, he was directing the movie-version of a musical, and Pee Wee was based on a character Burton didn’t create—but for the most part, I've adored his films. And he picks some of the best people to work on them, including Henry Selick. For those who don't know, Henry Selick is the director of The Nightmare Before Christmas, which was the second Burton film that helped forge my love of the beautiful and bizarre (the first was Batman Returns; Catwoman was my idol as a kid).

So Henry Selick is totally amazebeans. And he's also the director of Coraline. I love the film Coraline, and I love the book by Neil Gaiman…which is why I'm reviewing it! The book, not the movie. I read the book ages ago and when the film came out, I nearly had a heart attack of sheer epical happiness.

One thing I love about Neil Gaiman's attitude about Coraline is his distinction between adults and children. According to Mr. Gaiman, adults consider Coraline a horror story, but kids consider it a great adventure book. I must be a kid then (my mother-in-law once told a friend of hers that I was "one of them," meaning her two young daughters, because all three of us were jumping around crying, "Rise of the Guardians! Rise of the Guardians! Rise of the Guardians!") because I don't think Coraline is scary at all. I mean, the bad guy—bad lady?—makes me gasp and cry, "Oh, crap!" But it doesn’t give me nightmares or anything. I love it. It's freaky. It's bizarre. It's awesome. I love it.

So Coraline has a lot going for it: it starts off almost immediately with her finding the door and everything, it has a cat (I love cats), the buttons-thing is just bizarre, and it plays on something a lot of kids fantasize about—finding your "real" parents who of course treat you better than the parents you're living with, who give you all the things you really deserve and let you do all the things you want to that your current set of parents forbid. It's an awesome story.

I only have one real issue with Coraline. I get that she just moved to the new place and everything, but why doesn’t she have any friends her own age? Are there really no children around at all? In the movie we meet Wyborne (aka Wybie) before Coraline even finds the door to the Other Mother's house, but in the book she has no one she considers a friend. She's surrounded by adults. It's a fairly lonely adventure, seems to me. When I was a kid, if new kids moved into the neighborhood, our parents made us go out and say hello, try to make them feel welcome. That happened when I moved as a little kid. It's how I made my first two "friends" (they weren’t really my friends, but that took a while to figure out, and in the meantime, we did stuff together). So why doesn’t Coraline have any friends or child-acquaintances in the book? That's the only thing that gives me pause, and considering this book is middle-grade, it probably won't give any kids in that age group even a hitch. I just thought it needed pointing out.

All in all, Coraline gets 4/5 stars. The friend-thing throws me off, and it could have been a little longer while still staying in the middle-grade length. I like me some long books. So there's that. But all in all, I love it!

And everybody should read it and watch the movie—unless you're easily scared, in which case you probably shouldn’t.

See you later,

LA Knight

Zombie in Love by Kelly DiPucchio (5 STARS!)

Mortimer is looking for love. And he's looking everywhere! He's worked out at the gym (if only his arm wouldn't keep falling off). He's tried ballroom dancing lessons (but the ladies found him to be a bit stiff). He's even been on stalemate.com. How's a guy supposed to find a ghoul? When it seems all hope has died, could the girl of Mortimer's dreams be just one horrifying shriek away?

So I just read the most adorable children's book ever!

Now granted, I have some pretty bizarre tastes sometimes, though I enjoy traditional things too. But this picture book was sitting on one of the display bookcases at the library and it was such a random title that I had to grab it. It's called Zombie in Love by Kelly DiPucchio. It's a picture book for little kids, and so some people might think it doesn’t belong on my blog, but it does!  I'm reviewing it! Because it's awesome!!

Zombie in Love tells the story of Mortimer, the world's most adorable zombie in my opinion, who's looking for love in time for the Cupid's Ball. Obviously it was on display because of Valentine's Day's approach. Anyway, so Mortimer wants a girlfriend but nothing he does impresses the ladies. Could be because they're alive and he's dead, but I'm not one to judge cross-cultural relationships (after all, I'm a HUGE  fan of Lia Habel's zombie romance, Dearly, Departed).

Poor Mortimer (great name for a zombie, by the way, since you can shorten it to Mort) tries pretty much every romance trick in the book to get a girl. He tried chocolates (in a coffin-shaped box, too!) with a girl he rides the bus with; he tried giving the mail-lady a nice, shiny Valentine's Day heart (unfortunately it was shiny because it was fresh, seems like); he gave his favorite waitress a diamond ring (the snooty witch got upset because the severed finger was still in it; boo-hoo)! He read books on dating, tried picking up chicks at the dog-walking park, took dancing lessons, worked out at the gym (his arm kept falling off, though, when he tried to lift weights) — he even sang (moaned?) love songs on the sidewalk with a rose in his teeth. But nothing worked. Poor guy. I wanna hug him.

Except he probably smells dead. =(

But if he didn’t, I'd totally hug him.

So then he gets this idea to put an ad in the paper. Then, the night of the ball, he puts on a new suit, combs his hair, puts on his best cologne, and goes to see if any girl answered his ad. So the ball starts at seven, and Mortimer waits for forever (aka until almost midnight) but no girl shows up, and every time he tries to charm one of the girls already there, she screams and runs away. So eventually he gives up and he's about to leave when he hears this crash. When he turns around, lo and behold, there's this "drop-dead gorgeous" girl named Mildred — who is also a zombie.

Yay!

They dance, they go walking and hold hands (aka pop one of their hands off, give it to the other, then clasp hands — so Mortimer is holding Mildred's severed left hand in his left hand, while Mildred is holding Mortimer's severed right hand in her right hand, and his right hand and her left hand are clasping each other), they have a late-night dinner of brains and eyeballs with glasses of heart's blood in a cemetery. And then they get married and the limo says "His and Hearse" on the back and the cans tied to the back-bumper say things like "Cranbrainy Juice" and "Dead Bull" and "Baked Brains."

So basically this book had me going, "Oh! That's…kind of disturbing. But so cute!" pretty much every page. I love it. I want to own this book. I have a small collection of picture books and I want to add this book to my collection. It's a 5/5 stars. It's quirky, it's creepy, it's sweet and it's spooky. I imagine Morticia Addams reading it to Wednesday and Pugsley when they're little. I love it.

And the illustrations are cute, too!

Have a happy and creepy (and early) Valentine's Day,

LA Knight