I love how Mary Roach travels the world finding out the history of unusual things – whether sex research, deployed soldiers, or what happens to corpses. In Fuzz, she chronicles the hassles of people who have to deal with dangerous animals…often in encounters that are ridiculous, deadly, or both.
Bears that roam onto median strips dotted with crabapple trees, elephants that squash people (or worse, de-limb them like a tree), and dumb ocean birds that are unafraid to nest at airports are all unique hazards, and Mary Roach writes with humor about all of them.
As a video game writer constantly having to come up with fresh human-versus-beast conflicts, I found this book informative as well as hilarious. Definitely staying on my shelf.
What's to be done about a jaywalking moose? A bear caught breaking and entering? A murderous tree? Three hundred years ago, animals that broke the law would be assigned legal representation and put on trial. These days, as New York Times best-selling author Mary Roach discovers, the answers are best found not in jurisprudence but in science: the curious science of human-wildlife conflict, a discipline at the crossroads of human behavior and wildlife biology.
Roach tags along with animal-attack forensics investigators, human-elephant conflict specialists, bear managers, and "danger tree" faller blasters. Intrepid as ever, she travels from leopard-terrorized hamlets in…
There’s no shortage of indie novels out there that hit all the categories of young adult, fantasy, romance, and werewolf. This book is the best sample of the genre I’ve read that keeps everything you want and doesn’t bother with what you don’t.
Kat Kinney’s writing style really suits fantasy romance – her lyrical descriptions never have a blue sky when “vibrant cerulean” will do. When Lea (human) and Henrik (werewolf) hate and fear each other but are forced to survive together in the wilderness, the florid prose ratchets up the big feelings. This makes the central romance resonate where the “star-crossed lovers” bit could’ve felt overly familiar.
The magic system comes together nicely, allowing the yearning kids to challenge the nefarious ruling werewolves in a dramatic finish where the bonds they’ve made pay off.
Lea Wylder has spent so long hunting werewolves that now one is stalking her in her sleep. In the unforgiving forests of the north, shape-shifting wolves have enslaved the sole human city for hundreds of miles, driving survivors up into the mountains. When Lea tracks a shifter and finds him caught in a trap, she’s convinced he’s the white wolf from her dreams. Not that it matters. He’s one of them. And they’re at war.
But as Lea pulls back the bowstring, Henrik shifts to human and begs her not to shoot. By name. But how could he possibly know…
Where most fantasy is stuck squarely in pseudo-medieval times, Sons of Zeruiah goes back to the Bronze Age of the Old Testament.
A few shepherds, born illegitimate sons, try to better their stations by joining King David’s army in his battles against Saul for control of the Israelites. To do so, David has to beat or fool a lengthy list of other tribes (remember the Amalekites? It’s okay if you don’t) until he can make a claim that God sanctions his victory and win over the Israelites without a messy civil war.
And there’s a lot of blood. The violence of the novel is thoroughly described, just as gory as old-school Bible stories themselves. Any “acts of God” are subtle, not deus ex machinae. My only disappointment with the saga was that I’d forgotten it’s just book one of two, and it ends on a cliffhanger. So, if you’re into blood, lust, and smiting like I am, be prepared for two books.
Abishai, Joab, and Asahel live in the shadow of both shame and glory, from their uncle David's battlefield exploits and their mother's disgraceful past. When given the opportunity, will they prove themselves worthy to be called the nephews of Israel's greatest hero? Or will their misdeeds doom them forever to be remembered as the sons of Zeruiah? Drawing from Biblical, historical, and cultural sources, Brian Lee Meyer brings relatively unknown figures to life. Sons of Zeruiah: The Mighty Men of King David is an epic tale which takes its readers from the caves at Adullum to the siege of Jerusalem,…
In a near-future America where the study of qi produces near-magical effects, a lab accident releases the vampire virus EBL-4, turning its victims into villains. The corporation responsible, BRHI, tasks killers like Infinity DeStard to silence them.
But when the virus infects a lawyer named Morgan Lorenz, it suddenly becomes front-page news. He sues BRHI for massive medical negligence. Faced with potential ruin, the corporation counters with the last-ditch gambit that he can’t sue – being no longer human, vampires are unprotected by the Constitution.
Infinity’s placed on the team to wax Morgan before the case reaches the Supreme Court. Simple… except that she’s now infected, and if her team finds out, she’s dead. But how long can she tolerate injustice without getting her hands bloody?
