Little is recycled in this fresh, action-oriented installment of the Garbageman series.
This third volume of a supernatural series pits the saga’s heroes against an old enemy with new powers.
It’s been 14 years since David Turley, whose telekinesis can create the monstrous Garbageman, defeated the evil Hellann. Now, David and his wife, Julie, have settled into married life in Phoenix, Arizona, with their teenage son, Michael. Thanks to the chemical Neurogen that gave David and Julie special powers and immortality, Michael likewise possesses telekinesis—and the ability to see the dead. The boy’s best friend is a spirit named Francine, an African American teen who drowned. The Turleys’ idyllic life soon comes under fire when one of Hellann’s leftover minions starts possessing people and causing murderous havoc. David’s friend Joseph “Sarge” Finney loses his soul while battling this wraith. Bradley, a Hopi kachina (or spirit) who helped fight Hellann years ago, contacts Dr. Benjamin Donovan in nearby Carefree, Arizona. Donovan employs his Chronos device to remove “Lifetime” from terminally ill people who want to die. By using the Lifetime himself, Donovan has stopped aging and is 175 years old. After Bradley hides Sarge’s soul from the wraith in Flagstone, “the town of decay,” he asks Donovan to intervene. Alongside David’s powerful family, the doctor must save Sarge and protect him from Flagstone’s dangerous citizens. But with Dean at the helm, the rescue will prove a bumpy ride. As the wraith, normally a “bearded man with a smoky red-and-black form,” jumps from body to body, chaos ensues. This includes a knife-wielding shopper showing up at a mall and a dump truck driving against traffic on a highway. The author’s humanoid Tormentors boost the horror, with limbs “like spider legs except for the fingers and toes, which had claws.” Donovan’s presence adds fun, Ghostbusters-style technology to the mix, like his “Ocular Soul-Sensing Device.” In Flagstone, hellish surrealism appears in a forest filled with octopuses. Hellann’s much-threatened return draws Francine into a final battle, giving the ghost an important role. Despite the trilogy’s compact finale, Dean’s penchant for thematic expansion may lead to more “trashing time” ahead.
Little is recycled in this fresh, action-oriented installment of the Garbageman series.Pub Date: July 13, 2020
ISBN: 979-8-66-600052-6
Page Count: 316
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Though it falters a bit under its own weight, this series still has plenty of fight left.
In this long-awaited fifth installment of Shannon’s Bone Season series, the threat to the clairvoyant community spreads like a plague across Europe.
After extending her fight against the Republic of Scion to Paris, Paige Mahoney, leader of London’s clairvoyant underworld and a spy for the resistance movement, finds herself further outside her comfort zone when she wakes up in a foreign place with no recollection of getting there. More disturbing than her last definitive memory, in which her ally-turned-lover Arcturus seems to betray her, is that her dreamscape—the very soul of her clairvoyance—has been altered, as if there’s a veil shrouding both her memories and abilities. Paige manages to escape and learns she’s been missing and presumed dead for six months. Even more shocking is that she’s somehow outside of Scion’s borders, in the free world where clairvoyants are accepted citizens. She gets in touch with other resistance fighters and journeys to Italy to reconnect with the Domino Programme intelligence network. In stark contrast to the potential of life in the free world is the reality that Scion continues to stretch its influence, with Norway recently falling and Italy a likely next target. Paige is enlisted to discover how Scion is bending free-world political leaders to its will, but before Paige can commit to her mission, she has her own mystery to solve: Where in the world is Arcturus? Paige’s loyalty to Arcturus is tested as she decides how much to trust in their connection and how much information to reveal to the Domino Programme about the Rephaite—the race of immortals from the Netherworld, Arcturus’ people—and their connection to the founding of Scion, as well as the presence of clairvoyant abilities on Earth. While the book is impressively multilayered, the matter-of-fact way in which details from the past are sprinkled throughout will have readers constantly flipping to the glossary. As the series’ scope and the implications of the war against Scion expand, Shannon’s narrative style reads more action-thriller than fantasy. Paige’s powers as a dreamwalker are rarely used here, but when clairvoyance is at play, the story shines.
Though it falters a bit under its own weight, this series still has plenty of fight left.Pub Date: Feb. 25, 2025
ISBN: 9781639733965
Page Count: 576
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: Dec. 12, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A headbanging beginning to what could be a remarkable urban fantasy series—heavy metal playlist sadly not included.
After being murdered and inexplicably reborn, a heavy metal musician sets out on a journey of self-discovery with nothing short of the future of humankind at stake in the first installment of Sanderson and Orullian’s Strata Wars saga.
Jack Solomon is not having a good day. After moving to London from the mean streets of Los Angeles and starting a metal band called the Hounds of Winter, he’s been kicked out of the group just weeks before they’re scheduled to open for Black Sabbath at Wembley Stadium. While Jack is walking with his good friend Henry Wilkinson—a father figure of sorts who has mentored Jack over the years and owns the music venue the Iron Horse—they are both shot and (seemingly) killed. Then Jack regains consciousness and finds himself in a hellscape with a massive mountain of fire in the distance and countless human statues everywhere. After Henry appears in the vision, telling Jack, “You’ve got more to do,” Jack awakens in front of Henry’s flat, unharmed but covered in blood. With Henry’s body missing, Jack begins to understand his new reality: He’s a thanatist (don’t call him a necromancer) and Henry’s venue hides an entrance to the Strata—“several long periods of London history that have coalesced to form layers of the past.” The Strata are inhabited by gruesome creatures and millions of memories, and Jack discovers that someone wants to take over the Iron Horse, with its staircase to every level of the Strata, and begin a revolution where music (curated by a madman) can change the future of humanity. The many shoutouts to legendary bands notwithstanding, this novel is powered by two elements: the exceptional worldbuilding of the subterranean Strata, whose potential is virtually limitless; and Jack’s deeply personal healing journey, which includes forgiving others—like his mother, who abandoned him—and himself. Jack’s story arc is comparable to his adventures in the Strata: The deeper he descends into the Strata, the deeper he delves into himself.
A headbanging beginning to what could be a remarkable urban fantasy series—heavy metal playlist sadly not included.Pub Date: June 16, 2026
ISBN: 9781668068144
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Saga/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: April 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
PERSPECTIVES
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