River Readers

Marjorie Glatt feels like a ghost. A practical thirteen year old in charge of the family laundry business, her daily routine features unforgiving customers, unbearable P.E. classes, and the fastidious Mr. Saubertuck who is committed to destroying everything she’s worked for.

Wendell is a ghost. A boy who lost his life much too young, his daily routine features ineffective death therapy, a sheet-dependent identity, and a dangerous need to seek purpose in the forbidden human world.

An imaginative retelling of Moby Dick, but instead of sailors hunting the white whale, it's the whales hunting a legendarily dangerous sailor (or demon, perhaps). Our narrator is Bathsheba, a part of an all-female pod with a Captain who has declared that her destiny is to destroy the infamous Toby Wick. It's a destiny that may destroy them all instead and Bathsheba knows it.

One of the last things that the farm boy Worstley expects is to have a surly pixie bestow Chosen One status upon him. Although the pixie giving his goat the ability to speak was also unexpected. Worstley and the goat, Gustave, head off to meet their destiny at a nearby bramble-encased castle containing a sleeping princess and her equally unconcious court. It seems like as good a place as any to meet one's destiny.

This award winning series was worth reading even though it was outside my comfort zone. In any world, friends are a good thing to have, no matter what or where.

Maika has spent most of her life learning how to fight, but how will she fare when the only way to save her life...is to make friends? Collects issues 13-18 of the Hugo Award and British Fantasy Award series.
Goodreads.

This was a good story that explores more about how Maika ended up on the run. It's never easy to evaluate the choices in life,whether it's ones you made or will make or ones others made for you. Trust is had to understand.

An interesting start to a series I might end up liking. The artwork is amazing and I liked the steam punk backdrop. It was a good monster read for my Halloween-time needs.

Set in an alternate matriarchal 1900's Asia, in a richly imagined world of art deco-inflected steam punk, MONSTRESS tells the story of a teenage girl who is struggling to survive the trauma of war, and who shares a mysterious psychic link with a monster of tremendous power, a connection that will transform them both and make them the target of both human and otherworldly powers. Collects MONSTRESS #1-6

High in his attic bedroom, twelve-year-old David mourns the death of his mother, with only the books on his shelf for company. But those books have begun to whisper to him in the darkness. Angry and alone, he takes refuge in his imagination and soon finds that reality and fantasy have begun to meld. While his family falls apart around him, David is violently propelled into a world that is a strange reflection of his own -- populated by heroes and monsters and ruled by a faded king who keeps his secrets in a mysterious book, The Book of Lost Things.

Brangwain Spurge is an elf who has been nominated to take a rare relic to the goblin world as a gift of "peace" to the goblin ruler. Werfel is a historian in the goblin world and he has been selected to be host to Brangwain during his stay. However, all is not as it seems with this excursion.

This book was so good, that I read it again, actually, my husband and I took turns reading it to each other. My husband doesn't usually like fantasy, but this title was so well written, he enjoyed it tremendously. I was surprised at some of the things I missed the first time through (when I listened to it). GoodReads listed it as one of the top books of 2018 (actually it is on the top of several of their lists for 2018).

Another hilarious fantasy by Harper. Madrona comes to with no memory of how she got there, she is lying next to a dead faery. Shortly thereafter she is attacked by some goons. She believes she is a superhero, since she can bend time. However, all sorts of people react with fear to her presence. Definite cliffhanger ending though.

When Lana and her father return to their seaside hometown to help clear the debris of a storm, the last thing she expects is to discover a colony of Aquicorns—magical seahorse-like residents of the coral reef. As she explores the damaged town and the fabled undersea palace, Lana learns that while she cannot always count on adults to be the guardians she needs, she herself is capable of finding the strength to protect both the ocean, and her own happiness. --Goodreads

When the King and all the men of the castle die, it’s time for the women to knight up.

When King Mancastle and his mighty vassals ride off on a crusade, the women left behind are not at all put out—that’s a lot less armor polishing to do. Of course, when the men get themselves eaten by a dragon and leave a curse that attracts monsters to the castle . . . well, the women take umbrage with that.

Nice conclusion to the Percy series. Sometimes what you think is planned is way off course. Percy believes he is fated to die on or before his 16th birthday, but is ready to sacrifice himself to save New York. However, this final clash isn't all about him. Luke, Annabeth, Grover and many others all play a part in this final clash. Who knows what the future holds when everyone works together. Life will go on or maybe not!

There were so many things I learned listening to this final book that I want to have a movie marathon and reread the books! Jim Dale's voice shows so many nuances that I missed I almost felt like it was a whole new book. I recommend listening to this series just to hear him. I miss this series as much now as I did when I read it the first time.

Edmund and the Childe were swapped at birth. Now Edmund lives in secret as a changeling in the World Above, with fae powers that make him different from everyone else—even his unwitting parents and older sister, Alexis. The Childe lives among the fae in the World Below, where being human makes him an oddity at the royal palace, and where his only friend is a wax golem named Whick.

But when the cruel sorceress Hawthorne takes the throne, the Childe and Edmund realize that the fate of both worlds may be in their hands—even if they’re not sure which world they belong to.