Watch this first:

I think that might be the most intriguing trailer I’ve seen for a book! Plus they’ve even got a site setup for Symbogen. I was going to read this regardless, cause I loved Mira Grant’s previous series, but this just makes me want to read it more!

Here’s the description from Amazon:

A decade in the future, humanity thrives in the absence of sickness and disease.

We owe our good health to a humble parasite – a genetically engineered tapeworm developed by the pioneering SymboGen Corporation. When implanted, the tapeworm protects us from illness, boosts our immune system – even secretes designer drugs. It’s been successful beyond the scientists’ wildest dreams. Now, years on, almost every human being has a SymboGen tapeworm living within them.

But these parasites are getting restless. They want their own lives . . . and will do anything to get them.

Parasite will be released next week on the 29th of October and is £4.82 on Amazon.co.uk (paperback) and $12 on Amazon.com (hardcover).

I’m so looking forward to getting this book! It’s the seventh book in the October Daye series and with each one the story gets better. I wish they came out more often than just one a year, but then if that was the case we wouldn’t get the other cool series from Seanan McGuire (/Mira Grant).

Here’s the description from Amazon:

Things are starting to look up for October “Toby” Daye. She’s training her squire, doing her job, and has finally allowed herself to grow closer to the local King of Cats. It seems like her life may finally be settling down…at least until dead changelings start appearing in the alleys of San Francisco, killed by an overdose of goblin fruit.

Toby’s efforts to take the problem to the Queen of the Mists are met with harsh reprisals, leaving her under sentence of exile from her home and everyone she loves. Now Toby must find a way to reverse the Queens decree, get the goblin fruit off the streets–and, oh, yes, save her own life, since more than a few of her problems have once again followed her home. And then there’s the question of the Queen herself, who seems increasingly unlikely to have a valid claim to the throne….

To find the answers, October and her friends will have to travel from the legendary Library of Stars into the hidden depths of the Kingdom of the Mists–and they’ll have to do it fast, because time is running out. In faerie, some fates are worse than death.

October Daye is about to find out what they are.

If you’re interested in this series, I do recommend starting at the beginning with Rosemary & Rue.

I love zombies. And I love superheroes. So combining the two: yay!

I came across this book series last week while browsing at the Forbidden Planet and Nathan Fillion’s quote on the second cover jumped out at me. I still love being able to browse stores and come across books you normally might not come across. It’s another reason why I just don’t want to switch over to something like a Kindle.

Here’s the description from Amazon:

The Mighty Dragon. Stealth. Gorgon. Regenerator. Cerberus. Zzzap.

They were superheroes fighting to make Los Angeles a better place. Then the plague of living death spread. Billions died, civilization fell, and the City of Angels was left a desolate zombie wasteland. But the ex-humans aren’t the only threats the heroes face. Another group is amassing power . . . led by an enemy with the most terrifying ability of all.

I already started reading it and so far it’s great! The book jumps between Now and Then chapters. “Now” is two years after the zombie apocalypse and a group of survivors have converted the old Hollywood studios into their home. “Then” is first-person perspectives from the superheroes before and during the first outbreaks. I can’t wait to see this goes on; I’m so tempted to get its sequels (Ex-Patriots and Ex-Communication) to bring with me on holiday!

Ex-Heroes is available from Amazon.co.uk for £3.85.

I always like movies set in the near future with stories that feel really likely, but for some reason I rarely read books like that. That needs to change… Intrusion sounds like an interesting thriller/scifi: what if you could take a pill that when pregnant cures any genetic abnormalities of your child?

Here’s the description from Amazon:

Imagine a near-future city, say London, where medical science has advanced beyond our own and a single-dose pill has been developed that, taken when pregnant, eradicates many common genetic defects from an unborn child.

Hope Morrison, mother of a hyperactive four-year-old, is expecting her second child. She refuses to take The Fix, as the pill is known. This divides her family and friends and puts her and her husband in danger of imprisonment or worse. Is her decision a private matter of individual choice, or is it tantamount to willful neglect of her unborn child?

Intrusion by Ken MacLeod is £6.29 on Amazon.co.uk.

I’m totally loving the cover art of Fade To Black; it’s a gorgeous piece of work. I actually first came across this book on the Orbit blog where they did a post with the illustrator who did the cover art and it’s quite interesting to see the different stages the design went through.

Next to the awesome cover though, it looks like a cool book:

From the depths of a valley rises the city of Mahala. It’s a city built upwards not across–where streets are built upon streets, buildings upon buildings, A city that the Ministry rules from the sunlit summit and where the forsaken lurk in the darkness of Under.

Rojan Dizon doesn’t mind staying in the shadows, because he’s got things to hide. Things like being a pain-mage, with the forbidden power to draw magic from pain. But he can’t hide for ever.

Because when Rojan stumbles upon the secrets lurking in the depths of the Pit, the fate of Mahala will depend on him using his magic. And unlucky for Rojan – this is going to hurt.

Fade To Black is available on Amazon.co.uk for £5.59 and on Amazon.com for $10.19.

I love living in London. There’s always something cool going on or something interesting to do, no matter what you’re interested in. I realized that obviously it’s the perfect setting for a book series and started wondering what series out there are based in London?

I’m sure there are plenty more, but I came across this awesome sounding one God Save The Queen. Queen Victoria as a vampire? Current day steampunk? Werewolves, vampires and goblins? Comparisons to Seanan McGuire’s Toby Daye series? I need to get my hands on this book!

Here’s the description from Amazon:

The Year is 2012 – and Queen Victoria still rules with an immortal fist.

She’s the undead matriarch of a Britain where the Aristocracy is made up of werewolves and vampires, where goblins live underground and mothers know better than to let their children out after dark. A world where technology lives side by side with magic, where being nobility means being infected with the Plague (side-effects include undeath) and Hysteria is the popular affliction of the day.

Xandra Vardan is a member of the elite Royal Guard, and it’s her duty to protect the Aristocracy. But things get complicated when her sister goes missing. Xandra will not only realise she’s the prize in a dangerous power struggle – but she’ll also uncover a conspiracy that threatens to topple the empire itself.

God Save The Queen by Kate Locke is the first book in the Immortal Empire Series. It’s available on Amazon.co.uk for £5.59 and on Amazon.com for $11.55.

This sound like fun! Alchemy, magic and gargoyles…

Here’s the description from Amazon:

Alexandra Belarus is a struggling artist living in New York City, even though her family is rich in real estate, including a towering Gothic Gramercy Park building built by her great-great-grandfather. But the truth of her bloodline is revealed when she is attacked on the street and saved by an inhumanly powerful winged figure. A figure who knows the Belarus name…

Lexi’s great-great-grandfather was a Spellmason – an artisan who could work magic on stone. But in his day, dark forces conspired against him and his, so he left a spell of protection on his family. Now that Lexi is in danger, the spell has awoken her ancestor’s most trusted and fearsome creation: a gargoyle named Stanis. Lexi and Stanis are equally surprised to find themselves bound to each other. But as they learn to work together, they realize that only united can they save the city they both love…

Alchemystic by Anton Strout is £4.99 on Amazon.co.uk and $7.99 on Amazon.com.

My NY’s book resolutions seem to be going good: I’m exactly on track for my 52 books challenge and I haven’t bought a single book yet. I am allowing myself to buy 12 predetermined books this year though, and one of those will be Midnight Blue-Light Special.

It’s the second book in Seanan McGuire’s Incryptid series, again starring Verity Price, monster hunter/protector and professional ballroom dancer. I loved the first book; Verity is such a fun character. Plus the talking mice are awesome!

Here’s the description from Amazon:

The Price family has spent generations studying the monsters of the world, working to protect them from humanity–and humanity from them. Enter Verity Price. Despite being trained from birth as a cryptozoologist, she’d rather dance a tango than tangle with a demon, and when her work with the cryptid community took her to Manhattan, she thought she would finally be free to pursue competition-level dance in earnest. It didn’t quite work out that way…

But now, with the snake cult that was killing virgins all over Manhattan finally taken care of, Verity is ready to settle down for some serious ballroom dancing—until her on-again, off-again, semi-boyfriend Dominic De Luca, a member of the monster-hunting Covenant of St. George, informs her that the Covenant is on their way to assess the city’s readiness for a cryptid purge. With everything and everyone she loves on the line, there’s no way Verity can take that lying down.

Alliances will be tested, allies will be questioned, lives will be lost, and the talking mice in Verity’s apartment will immortalize everything as holy writ–assuming there’s anyone left standing when all is said and done. It’s a midnight blue-light special, and the sale of the day is on betrayal, deceit… and carnage.

Midnight Blue-Light Special by Seanan McGuire will be released on March 5 and will be £4.94 on Amazon.co.uk and $7.99 on Amazon.com.

I had heard a lot of good things about Brent Weeks’ Night Angel trilogy, so I was quite happy to discover the boxset was one my Christmas presents this year! I just started the first book The Way of Shadows and so far it’s been good. I’m only 100 pages in, but I’m liking it so far even though the world is a bit harsh.

Here’s the description of the first book (The Way of Shadows) on Amazon:

The perfect killer has no friends. Only targets.

For Durzo Blint, assassination is an art. And he is the city’s most accomplished artist, his talents required from alleyway to courtly boudoir.

For Azoth, survival is precarious. Something you never take for granted. As a guild rat, he’s grown up in the slums, and learned the hard way to judge people quickly – and to take risks. Risks like apprenticing himself to Durzo Blint.

But to be accepted, Azoth must turn his back on his old life and embrace a new identity and name. As Kylar Stern, he must learn to navigate the assassins’ world of dangerous politics and strange magics – and cultivate a flair for death.

The Night Angel trilogy consists (obviously) of three parts:

• The Way of Shadows (£5.93 on Amazon.co.uk, $7.99 on Amazon.com)
• Shadow’s Edge (£7.19 on Amazon.co.uk, $7.99 on Amazon.com)
• Beyond The Shadows (£5.99 on Amazon.co.uk, $7.99 on Amazon.com)

You can’t judge a book by its cover, but you can certainly be charmed by a book’s cover! I love the cover from Geist; it’s so pretty and has got me at once interested in the book. You can straightaway see it’s about mages and ghosts, and reading the summary seems to confirm that. I’m intrigued by the lion though… nothing I’ve read so far seems to mention anything about him.

Here’s the summary from Amazon:

Between the living and the dead is the Order of the Deacons, protectors of the Empire, guardians against possession, sentinels enlisted to ward off malevolent hauntings by the geists. Sorcha, among the most powerful of the Order, is called to a small settlement, But more is occuring than just geist activity. It’s a conspiracy of evil that reaches back to her own Abbey. Even if she survives, what hell would she be returning to?

Do you like the look of Geist? I’ll need to wait at least a year before picking it up (because of my self imposed book buying ban), but I’m curious to see if this is any good!

Geist by Philippa Ballantine is £5.24 on Amazon.co.uk and $7.99 on Amazon.com.