Life Out of Order, Love Out of Time

Life Out of Order 

 By Audrey Niffenegger

 

Gripping from the first sentence, even if you've never read 'The Time Traveler's Wife'. 

From a mere heavily policed 2022 with curfews and at-risk groups and circling black helicopters to a future significantly more challenging, and back again and forward again, it's a sign of this author's mastery that readers are always immediately anchored in the who, the where, the when. Alma and Zach and their friends and co-resisters are quickly drawn and instantly engaging. We want so much for them to have happiness but as their lives tangle and the threads of Fate spool out, we can never be sure of anything more than their present. It's an emotional roller coaster with intermittent coasting, just enough to catch our breath before the tension climbs again. 

There's familiar ground here for science fiction readers too: not only the time travel but interfaces and uploads and tech taking directions unintended by its creators. But ultimately it's about the characters, their lives and lies, their loves and friendships.

The early chapters seem particularly timely (pardon the reference) for the fall of 2026 when ICE operates unchecked in American cities and the word 'antifa' is hurled like a grenade at anyone left of Attila the Hun (much like Al Qaeda used to be in the 2000s)  Zeigeist is an overused concept but captures the spirit of resistance so cleverly woven in all its hope and despair and dogged determination. I had to ask myself if I'd have been as entranced if the menace of the early fascist elements was less, but I don't have a clear answer. I had to read on, though, to learn if the characters escaped - kind of like in The Handmaid's Tale - and was gradually drawn into their ongoing emotional lives beyond the sociopolitical threat. 

Well worth a read today and any day, but not for those looking for a cosy time-traveling mystery, romance, or fantasy novel like the Jodi Taylor St Mary series. This is more like Aimée & Jaguar if Michael Crichton had collaborated with Erica Ficsher: beautiful, haunted, hopeful, fatal.

#LifeOutOfOrder #Niffenegger #PenguinRandomHouse #timetravel #romance #love #loss #death #resistance #implants #AI #politics #marriage #divorce 

All the holiday heart of “Miracle on 34th St.“ but with homicide

Murder on 34th Street
by Mariah Fredericks 

OCTOBER 6, 2026

Does anybody invoke the spirit of 1930s New York City as well as this author does?

As an editor, I often I’m forced to tell authors some variation of “ get the reader grounded in the scene.” and I am seldom wowed by a description of setting. But in this book, navigating the largest department store in the world (as of 1932)  with Miss Grace Verlander, assistant to the personnel manager, made me "Wow!" out loud. Macy’s department store was huge, covering nearly an entire city block, and the statistics that follow are enough to make anybody gasp. They include not only the number of employees but the fact that it takes 270 people just to clean the place. 

 

This setting not only serves to give the reader a sense of how big the place is and how complex, but it also sets up our narrator's job: Grace is assistant to the head of personnel. She solves problems all over this immense building, for its thousands of staff and millions of customers. And she very subtly works in how the Great Depression is affecting shoppers and threatens jobs, even though she avoids mentioning the word depression or indeed much about the external economy or political situation. At least until they become relevant to the unfolding mystery. A promising start, for sure.

I also admire the way, with so many peripheral characters named in those early pages, we always know which ones will be important: they’re the ones she stops for conversations with on her way through the memorable store, those who do and say memorable things; those who stand out from the throngs. The detective, the juggler, the gorgeous perfume counter woman who will be throwing candy canes to children during the Macy’s Santa Claus parade. 

 

Oh, and Santa himself, who has just received a threatening letter he wants Grace to deal with....

All that said, there is quite a lot of set up. It is entertaining, and Miss Verlander voice is lively, consistent, a combination of competence, irreverence, and generally good-natured snark, but this is not a high tension opening. The pace picks up satisfactorily and the sleuthing is smart. The characters all feel very real and their stories go straight to the heart of life in 1932 New York City.

If you want to start this in October as a means of avoiding Halloween saturation, you won't regret the hours spent with Grace. She's also good company for November reading, when you’re just getting your holiday spirit revved up and aren’t completely flattened by the overload of carols and baking and shopping. Highly recommended.

 

#Netgalley #Minotaur #MiracleOn34thStreet #MakeItMurder #MurderForChristmas #Holidays #Christmas #MiracleOn34thStreet #amreading #bokreview #NewRelease #CandyCanes #MacysParade #SantaClaus #SantaParade #sleuthing #amateurdetective #cops #WindowDressing #nativityscene #NewYorkCity #NYC #KissTheGuy #Family  

Emily in Austria: The Sound of... skritching...

 Emily Wilde series 

by Heather Fawcett 

Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands

See also

 Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries

(and soon) Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales

ALSO : COMING Jan 19, 2027  

Emily Wilde's History of Dark Faerie (shivers!) 

*Be aware that these are fairy tales in the OLD sense, where the Fae are beautiful beyond words but also deadly: treacherous, amoral, and careless of mortal frailties where they are not outright cruel beyond human comprehension. Do not read these to your pre-teen children - or to any adults prone to nightmares.

More Emily! More Wendell! Plus Emily's academic niece and a senior professor even more annoying than Wendell! 

When Professor Emily Wilde [SPOILER: yes, she got tenure!] sets out with a mummified faun foot to complete her map of Faerie realms accessible from the Austrian Alps - and incidentally outdo that previous daring scholar of dryadology, Danielle DeGrey, who vanished in those same alps many years ago - she doesn't intend it to be a family affair. But her would-be fiance insists on accompanying her, and her niece, a promising dryadology student, is desperate for fieldwork experience to boost her academic standing. None of them expect the frosty old department head to come along, but he's determined to prove Emily has fallen into Wendell's slovenly attitude to academic rigor. And if there's any glory to be had in learning the fate of the missing DeGrey, he wants his share.

Of course Shadow the hound attends. Where Emily goes, he goes  - with one noteworthy exception (see the latter half of Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries) -  since he's convinced she will come to harm at the hands of the Fae if he's not there to protect her. And in case there are sausages, or a nice mutton chop... a whole ham... whatever else might be available in an Austrian Alpine village for a very large dog not entirely discerning about dietary matters. 

But even Shadow may not be enough defense for Emily or her party when assassins descend!

Then there are the ribbons - draped on a mysterious interloper, soaked in salt water, tied on shrubs or hanging from trees. I'd love to say more but we're deep in the mystery now, and the scholarly party has barely arrived at the Alpine village. They're warned by the villagers to lock their doors at dark, but that doesn't quite prepare our intrepid academics for the skritching that goes on through the night, or the gouges around the lock they find by morning light. 

If I thought the first Emily adventure might be a fluke, this one has pleasantly reassured me. The pace hops right along. The characters, both returning and new, are quickly sketched and instantly alive with personality. The settings grow like a fairy glamour from a few words and a twist of the fingers. The humour is light and deft while the banter between Emily and Wendell continues delightfully snarky. Emily's head is still a treasure trove of fairy tales and scholarly lore and surprising - to herself - deeply emotional moments. She's quite disarmingly concerned about how her brusqueness affects the young women she must interact with and mentor. 

As before, the complications arising from involvement with both wee and High Fae twine upon themselves like the most gnarled of oak branches, with at least as much risk to the hapless mortals below. The resolution is both satisfying and surprising. 

Highly recommended, even if you didn't read the first Emily book (but you really should!). It's like the Sound of Music only if that charming tale were written by 3 drunk dryadology scholars and edited by Agatha Christie. 

 #Netgalley #EmilyWilde #EncyclopediaOfFairies #fantasy #fiction #academia #scholarly #Cambridge #professor #gradstudents #dryadology #Austria #Germanic #fairytales #brownies #sprites #foxfae #HighFae #DarkFae #DarkFantasy #winter #InvisibleLibrary #GenevieveCogman #AgathaChristie #MapOfTheOtherlands #TheScholarAndTheLastFaerieDoor #HGParry 

 

Everything's coming up Emily...Wilde, that is!

 Emily Wilde series by Heather Fawcett 

Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries

See also (soon):

Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands

Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales

COMING SOON: Emily Wilde's History of Dark Faerie (shivers!) 

*Be aware that these are fairy tales in the OLD sense, where the Fae are beautiful beyond words but also deadly: treacherous, amoral, and careless of mortal frailties where they are not outright cruel beyond human comprehension. Do not read these to your pre-teen children - or to any adults prone to nightmares.

It's impossible to praise just one of the Emily Wilde books and do it justice. Even though they can be read alone, the 3 books available so far have beautifully connected stories that flow together like one longer story that we readers are privileged to join for the journey in each part. I dipped into the 3rd book last fall when it showed up on the New Release shelf of my local library, and instantly had to go back and start at the 1st book to learn how Emily got to that VERY intriguing opening sequence. 

The writing, the characters, the setup were all catnip to one who has loved Genevieve Cogman's INVISIBLE LIBRARY series or The Scholar and the Last Faerie Door by H.G. Parry. The undergrad character Grace in Natasha Pulley's The Watchmaker of Filigree Street. Lydia, wife of James Asher in the vampire novels by Barbara Hambly: a brilliant medical researcher & sometimes paranormal investigator. Or any other book about academic women of any era who investigate arcane mysteries while fending off putdowns by their patriarchal department heads, fellow professors, and disapproving family members (male, mostly). They are  all women in men's worlds, investigating and at risk from dangers both mortal and.. extra-mortal, which includes a number of options beyond simply paranormal.

I've since devoured all three Emily books currently available and can unhesitatingly recommend them to anyone who loves strong women, academia, feminism, and the Fae. In fact, I've been known to read snippets out loud to family and friends, because the gentle humour and snarky sidelights on life with males have near-universal appeal. 

But enough about me. Back to Emily.

In Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faerie, we quickly learn that Emily's a professor whose area of study is Dryadology, the study of all things related to the Fae. From her journal, which forms the backbone of the narration, it's clear that she's starting field work in a tiny village on an island called Ljosland that might - or might not - correspond to the Norwegian region of the same name known to our modern world. 

In her world, roughly akin to early Edwardian British Isles, dryadology is a recognized field of academic endeavour and women can earn degrees in it (they couldn't receive degrees in England until the 1920s in our world).  To make her mark and cement her place in the department, Emily's attempting to finish off her Encyclopedia of Faerie with a series of additional entries on the Folk: the Hidden of this region (from the High Fae, or Tall Ones, to the wee brownies, sprites, fox-faeries and others of their lesser stature). She's been working on her Encyclopedia for nine years already, and when it's finally finished and accepted for publication, it will be the most comprehensive of its kind in her world. A worthy endeavour indeed, and one that might finally shift her title from adjunct professor to tenured one.

Before she can begin, though, this gently-bred and college-residing scholar must learn to fend for herself (and her immense black hound) in the extremely rustic conditions of her rented cottage: chop her own firewood, haul her water from the stream out back, shovel snow, and lug provisions up the steep track from the nearest village. She must make pleasant conversation with her landlord and the villagers, a skill she has never yet managed to master. As she says herself, "I may be a poor judge of human feeling, but I have had plenty of experience with putting my feet wrong..." Her interactions with the amused, occasionally bemused, and sometimes hostile locals are a constant source of simmering amusement to readers even as they frustrate Emily's efforts to get her studies under way.. 

But all that is nothing to the frustration she feels when her department's Golden Boy, Professor Bambleby, turns up with two graduate students in tow, blithely declaring he is there to oversee her efforts. And he arrives just before the winter snows set in, making it impossible for Emily to send him packing back to England.

 Worst of all, her dog likes him!

The journal entries in Emily's inimitable, irascible voice are a delight to read, and the scholarly footnotes provide much background information via references to species of fae and other scholarly works related to her current pursuits. Although technically fictitious - certainly the footnotes and cited scholars are - the stories themselves are based in oral traditions of the Fae all over Europe and the British Isles. Endlessly alluring partial tales that hint at solutions Emily needs for those very problems that crop up in an isolated village too often visited by the dangerous courtly fae with their predilection for stealing human children. They're also helpful in guiding her careful negotiations with the local wee folk who, though mostly harmless and willing to provide information for her studies in exchange for sweet treats and other tokens, may still turn on her or give her up to more dangerous fae to save themselves.

But then those adorable wee ones meet Professor Bambleby, and their extreme reactions to him set Emily's senses on high alert. Just who - or what - will be sharing her cottage over the dark, cold months?

The mystery and adventure of the following winter is a page-turner, with other-worldly excursions and twisty deals with fae both Tall and wee, through breathtaking scenery and spellbinding terror. And always a new problem to solve that needs every nuance Emily can glean from her mind's encyclopedic knowledge of fairy tales the world over. 

I left Emily's world this first time with relief, joy, wonder, and eagerness for more.

#Netgalley #EmilyWilde #EncyclopediaOfFairies #fantasy #fiction #academia #scholarly #Cambridge #professor #gradstudents #dryadology #Scandinavian #fairytales #brownies #sprites #HighFae #DarkFae #DarkFantasy #winter #InvisibleLibrary #GenevieveCogman #TheScholarAndTheLastFaerieDoor #HGParry #AsherVampireSeries #LydiaAsher #BarbaraHambly

 

 

 

 

The Mystic and the Missing Girl

 

The Mystic and the Missing Girl 

 

 by Vikki VanSickle

Pub Date: Sep 8 2026

 

Who doesn’t love a tarot card mystery? Or a shop filled with shiny crystals and little kits for manifesting luck, love, abundance,. Or an old, cold case of a missing teen girl from when our protagonist was in high school

Selling those kept the shop, and the eccentric Hannah Mystic, small town TV psychic, in groceries for most of her adult life. But none of those kits or crystals worked for the teenage Ginny, who disappeared 20 years ago this year. All that’s left of the very cold case are a few cryptic clues in Hannah's vision journals that didn’t leave the police anywhere useful.

Now Hannah‘s niece Drew is running the store, and her old high school, chemistry partner, now a hotshot - and simply hot - big city reporter, is back in her store and probing her hidden sore spots. A confirmed skeptic about psychic phenomena, he's digging up the old case for an anniversary revisit and he wants Hannah‘s old journals to see if he can make sense of the deceased psychic’s visions.

But Drew wants no part of raking up the past notoriety of her family and the shop. That someone vandalized her front window makes her think there’s more to this anniversary than meets the eye. What will the cards say? If Drew can bring herself to read them, that is. She has been hiding her psychic gifts ever since high school, rather than take on the notoriety or mockery or duration directed at her aunt.

Inserted throughout is tarot lore: mention of famous card sets and their designers, discussions of what each tarot could mean, mentions of how some religions view card reading and other spirituality tools as the devil’s work. I liked how the first reading Drew does is kind of a map to her opening dilemma and the journey ahead. I was tempted to bookmark that first reading so I could come back to check on progress. The tarot also opens moments of more serious acknowledgements - of loss and grief, of what we owe to those who have passed on.

Present are the usual cosy mystery collection of cutesy businesses and eccentric small town characters, some with secrets related to the old disappearance and some whose unrelated secrets are hindering the renewed investigation. There’s an old crush and sometimes-hookup whose slimy behaviour is brilliantly excoriated by both Drew and her friend Gigi. You will love to hate him too, even while he works his possibly fatal attraction on you. There is at least one chat message string in the missing girl's history that will chill any woman to the bone. In other words, a good diversity of flavourings around the main meat of the mystery.

It's been described as 'Veronica Mars meets Schitt's Creek', and while our protagonist is older than Veronica and the townsfolk not quite as zany as Moira Rose and her clueless cohort, there's definite resonance. Plus, for all the mystical trappings, this is a competently investigated mystery with compelling twists, and a strong resolution that resonates with our protagonist’s personal life as well.

#Netgalley #TheMysticAndTheMissingGirl #NewRelease #StMartinsMinotaur #Tarot #CardReadings #disappearance #unsolved #mystery #smalltown #crimefiction #cosycrime #HometownGirl #HighSchoolHottie #psychometry #prediction #visions #police #corruption #friendship #frenemy

---

The Henchperson's Guide to Unionizing 

by Marshall J. Moore 

My second Frankenstein retelling novel for this season is quite different from the previous one. Although they're both told by/about sidekicks rather than the doctor or his creation, this one is from the point of view of the misshapen laboratory assistant, Igor. And that is only one of the quixotic differences from the original and its many successors.

The set up is swift, with a pitchforks-and-torches mob advancing on the derelict castle while the doctor is in the final stages of his latest attempt to reanimate a cobbled-together corpse. Thanks to Igor’s forethought and recognition of inevitability involving the trajectory local villagers' suspicions, the pair escapes the castle with most of their laboratory equipment and supplies, abandoning their shocked but immobile experiment. They set up a new workshop in a distant region where the doctor has some claim on a long-deserted manor house with a suitable tower, not too close to a town but not too distant from a cemetery where fresh – relatively fresh – parts can be had for their next experiment.

The writing is swift and sure. Igor is a convincing and sympathetic character. The doctor is as much of a jerk as you might expect, but Igor tries to make the best of things. His commitment to his unremunerated job is one of his endearing qualities. He might be almost the perfect employee, willing to turn his hand to any number of grizzly tasks and swallow any number of degrading insults from his master. Kind of like Wormtongue is treated by Saruman, but with a much worse clothing allowance.

But sooner or later, every worm must turn. And it appears Igor is about to turn chief cook and bottle washer for a collection of unwanted housemates in the new abode. One consolation is that there are now other minions at hand, also being insulted by, respectively, their master or mistress. For the first time in as long as he can remember, Igor isn’t alone with his servitude. And in companionship comes common purpose, even, eventually, solidarity. 

The writing is competent, the voice of Igor flawless. The story unfolds at a clipping, but totally cohesive pace, with excellent characterization and goals that are easy to identify with, no mean feet considering they involve not only Igor and the doctor but a cat that is not a cat and a vampire with yearnings for a life beyond drinking blood. And … Something Else. 

You might think that this sets up a horrifying paranormal tale, but it’s actually a fascinating character study that explores consent and servitude, bullying and respect, ethical dilemmas and the choice to do good in a world where so many around you are bad.

I was sorry when this one came to a close. Even though the wrap-up itself was satisfying, I just liked these characters and wanted to spend more time with them. It's a story with a lot of heart, even disregarding those examples in the spare parts crypt.

 

 #TheHenchpersonsGuidetoUnionizing #NetGalley #Horror #SFF #humorous #cat #Igor #Frankenstein #sidekicks #vampires #demons #witches #werewolf #paranormal #cemetery #castle #lightning #HeartsInJars #brains #PenguinRandomHouse 

Frankenstein Meets Wuthering Heights

 

Her Creation

by Jeneane O'Riley 

 This book has several content warnings at the front, and every one of them is earned. If any of them concern you, this is not the book for you. 

'Her Creation' is a feminine (not necessarily feminist) retelling of the Frankenstein story, in which young Victoria grows up with her eccentric doctor father in a run-down castle in a forest where he alternates between perfecting his surgical techniques on cadavers and stitching up the wealthy landowners' wastrel sons after their drunken reckless exploits. Victoria is dreaming of learning reincarnation to restore her much-missed mother, and assumes her father is working toward the same end. As with many modern retellings, there are female friendships to counter the traditional solitary-genius trope, nods to same-sex relationships that wouldn't be discussed openly in that era, and other nods to modern sensibilities that were not, for the most part, particularly intrusive or distracting (ymmv). 

The framing is of a female scholar signing on with a shipboard expedition to map the great northern wastes, when they find a very large, much-scarred man seemingly half-frozen on the ice. The scholar keeps a journal about her patronizing and patriarchal treatment by the crew that soon elides, after meeting the monster and his mystery-woman maker, into a recounting of how the unlikely pair ended up there. There are some philosophical musings from the aging Doctor Frankenstein about the nature of life, politics, morality, and the responsibilities of healers. Much of the language and atmosphere is redolent of the original text, though filtered through a feminine narrator..

The erotic fascination with the monster is writ larger upon the page than in any previous retelling I've encountered. The monster's obsession with her is also deeply explored. Think Wuthering Heights meets, well, Frankenstein. If you're reading for the slow-burn, dark, sexual energy, you won't be disappointed.

If you're not thus enamoured, the scholar seen so briefly at start and end may feel like the more interesting character. While the fiction of her recording Victoria's story continues in dated and located log book entries, the story and voice is all Victoria's (or, occasionally, the monster's) to carry. It starts too early in Victoria's young life and goes too long on too little forward motion beyond the passage of time, with too much interior musing between lines of dialogue or brief action sequences. Victoria's actions and reactions don't always seem credible. Too many pages in the first half are taken up with circular anguished emoting that leads nowhere, while the narrative largely glosses over her reaction/response to a very realistic and repeatedly traumatizing situation that is certain to be quite triggering for unwary readers. The writing is occasionally clumsy and self-contradicting, throwing us out of the fictive historical-seeming world with words like 'okay' and phrases about 'outing' someone dropped into the midst of scenes that should be the most immersive of all. It needed a sensitive copy-edit to keep the author's enthusiastic prose from charging past peak emotional and sensual impacts in a gush of weakening words and phrases.

And yet... there are moments, short speeches, a touch here or a gaze there, filled with love and depth and searing clarity that make it worth reading to the end. 

#ThanksNetGalley #HerCreation #FrankensteinRetold #DarkFantasy #erotic #sensual #scary