paranormal – Everything Is Better With Dragons

TBR Review: Winter’s Gifts, by Ben Aaronovitch

Series: Rivers of London (#9.5)
Characters: Kimberley Reynolds
Format: 211 pages, Hardcover
Published: June 8, 2023 by Orion
ISBN: 9781473224377 (ISBN10: 1473224373)

Description

When retired FBI Agent Patrick Henderson calls in an ‘X-Ray Sierra India’ incident, the operator doesn’t understand. He tells them to pass it up the chain till someone does.

That person is FBI Special Agent Kimberley Reynolds. Leaving Quantico for snowbound Northern Wisconsin, she finds that a tornado has flattened half the town – and there’s no sign of Henderson.

Things soon go from weird to worse, as neighbours report unsettling sightings, key evidence goes missing, and the snow keeps rising – cutting off the town, with no way in or out…

Something terrible is awakening. As the clues lead to the coldest of cold cases – a cursed expedition into the frozen wilderness – Reynolds follows a trail from the start of the American nightmare, to the horror that still lives on today…

My Review

A novella from last year that’s been sat on my TBR pile for a while! I’ve been prompted to read it by the arrival of the latest Rivers of London novella. I thought I’d better get up to date.

Kimberley Reynolds is sent to the Great Lakes in the middle of winter to deal with an incident with unusual characteristics, and is snowed in almost immediately. Stuck without back-up, and her contact missing, she must discover what’s going on, what it has to do with an exhibition by the Virginia Gentlemen in 1848 and where Henderson in. Unfortunately, she’s not the only one looking into things, and it gets complicated when the local meteorologist takes her out to the site of the 1848 winter camp. Malevolent forces are at work, a teenage genius loci comes to the rescue, and Kimberly falls in love.

Kimberley Reynolds is a character that pops up in some of the novels but to be honest, she never struck me as a interesting character, or one I’d taken much note of. However, this novella gives the reader more information about her background and develops her character. I enjoy these novellas because they allow Aaronovitch to explore characters and locations without a full novel focused on Peter. He does make an appearance, over the phone and in her head, but it’s mainly about Kimberley and her slowly blossoming romance with William, while investigating both modern and historical crimes.

The dust jacket is cool too.

Recommended for fans of the series.

Extract: ‘The Pluckley Psychic Historical Society’, by Grahame Peace

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**Publisher:** Independently published

**Publication Date**: 25th November 2018

**Format:** Paperback

**ISBN-13:** 978-1790331239

**Price:** £6.99

Buy Link

BLURB
The Pluckley Psychic Historical Society is based in Pluckley, Kent, the most haunted village in England. Its founding members are the noted academic, historian, and Cambridge scholar Winston Hatherton, the white witch Florence Dearden, and the celebrated medium Jocasta Bradman. They are assisted by an 18th-century super-ghost called Jasper Claxton, although none of the society members are aware that Jasper is a ghost.

This is the third book in ‘The Ghost from the Molly-House’ series,and this book describes how the Psychic Historical Society was set up and goes back to the group’s first two official cases in 1919, just after the end of the first world war. The first story, ‘The Jewellery Box’ involves a 16th-century jewellery box made from precious metals, which is found buried in a garden and reveals a 400-year-old mystery.
The second story, ‘The Book of Souls’ is set in Huddersfield,England, at a place called Jubilee Tower or Castle Hill, which was built to commemorate the diamond jubilee of Queen Victoria and is on the site of ancient bronze and iron age settlements dating back 4000 years. An old book of spells is found, and once opened, it appears to have released something ominous.

The Ghost from the Molly-House series is a collection of amusing paranormal mysteries, which will appeal to fans of history, period detective novels, tales of haunted houses, and all things that go bump in the night.Although this is the third book in the series, the novel can be enjoyed as a stand-alone story in its own right.

I had planned to review this book, but I’ve been ill and my depression is bad so I’m not managing to keep up with my schedule. Instead, the author has provided an extract from the book to whet your appetites.

Review: ‘A funny thing happened on the way to heaven’ by Corey Taylor

2013
Ebury Press

This second book by Stone Sour and Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor follows on from Seven Deadly Sins in a round about way. He is again pondering the mysteries of life and death while sprinkling the whole with memories. This time it is his experiences with ghosts. Ever since he was young he has had encountered the paranormal and lived in various haunted buildings. People have told him their own ghost stories; they are gathered here with the express intention of starting a conversation.

Corey Taylor is an articulate and intelligent, if uneducated, man and has clearly thought his ideas through. Whether the reader believes the stories he tells or agrees with his hypothesis of ‘intelligent energy’ is up to them. He won’t tell you what to think, only to think.

I’m not sure whether I agree with much that he has written, except that people need to use their intelligence and not let ignorance and dogma control them. He clearly believes and feels strongly about the subject. It shines in his writing. The writing style is conversational, he goes off at a tangent regularly, but that is not necessarily to the detriment of the work.

An enjoyable and interestting look in to the mind of an important member of the Metal music fraternity.

Bye,

Rose