Coming Up in 2012 #1: Talina in the Tower by Michelle Lovric

Throughout January 2011 I ran a feature on The Book Zone titled "Coming Up in 2011" where I asked authors with new stand-alone or first-in-series books due out in that year to write a short big-up about their new book. This seemed like quite a popular feature at the time and so I have decided to run it again this year.

The first book I want to showcase is Talina in the Tower by Michelle Lovric. If you tend to judge a book by its cover then you will already be shouting that it doesn't look particularly boy-friendly. However, neither did the covers of her previous two books for younger readers, The Undrowned Child and The Mourning Emporium, and yet both of these books are easily amongst my favourite of the past couple of years. As you will read in Michelle's description, Talina in the Tower is not a sequel to these two stories, although it is set in Venice and I hope will be just as magical as Michelle's other two books set in that amazing city. Here is Michelle to tell you a little more about Talina:

Talina in the Tower is the tale of a boy who loves to argue and a girl who is more passionate than she is careful. Ambrogio dreams of being a barrister. His friend Talina, the daughter of an archivist, has earned herself the reputation of being the most impudent girl in Venice. When she’s not campaigning for egrets’ rights, or terrorizing the school librarian, Talina adores reading, cooking and magic.

The story takes place in a sinister nineteenth-century Venice, one inhabited not just by frightened people but also by bully-boy tomcats, educated rats and ravenous vultures. In the dead of night, savage hyena-like creatures called Ravageurs prowl the waterways of Venice, snatching men and women, not to mention children and cats.

When Talina’s parents disappear, she and her loyal cat, Drusilla, are forced to go to live with her sinister Guardian in his gaunt and lonely tower on the northernmost edge of the city. In the tower’s kitchen, Talina cooks up an unusual problem for herself: a complete change of identity – and species. It is only Ambrogio who recognizes Talina in her new state. The two friends become caught up in a fast-paced adventure, one in which Talina can never be sure whether she is more human than cat, rat, vulture … or Ravageur. If she wants to stay in girl form, fiery Talina must stay serene and reasonable. And yet, as the monstrous plans of the Ravageurs become more menacing, brutal and sarcastic, who would NOT be inclined to lose their temper?

The story explores ideas of ownership and identity. Who owns a city? What can a child own? How can you stay true to yourself, and yet grow as a person?

Set thirty years before The Undrowned Child and The Mourning Emporium, this book stands alone. But readers of the earlier books will meet up with a couple of old friends – in their younger days.

Huge thanks to Michelle for writing this for us. Talina in the Tower is published by Orion and is scheduled to be released at the beginning of February. Michelle tells me that there will be more information about the book appearing on her website in January.

Review: The Beast by Barry Hutchison (Invisible Fiends)

Kyle is having trouble with the neighbours. They’ve turned into black-eyed, flesh-eating zombies. Now would be a good time to leave town but out there, on the snow covered streets, something far worse is lurking.

There is a beast in the shadows and the only way for Kyle to fight it is to use his powers. But every time Kyle uses them, he weakens the barrier between this world, and the terrifying, world of the Darkest Corners. If the barrier breaks there will be more killers on the streets.

I feel I must offer my apologies in advance for the brevity of this review. However, there is a very good reason for its relative shortness: to write as much as I normally do would create spoiler after spoiler as in The Beast a number of our Invisible Fiends questions are answered, and there are also a handful of "What the.....?" moments that you really will not see coming. If I had read a review where these were revealed to me in advance I would have been livid! In the words of Lord Melchett the plot of The Beast "twists and turns like a twisty-turny thing" and I am sure that you will need to be picking your jaw off the ground at least once during the story.

The Beast is possibly Barry's least scary Invisible Fiends book to date. However, this isn't saying much considering how pants-wettingly terrifying the first four books in the series have been and there are still more than enough nail-biting scenes to keep you balancing precariously on the edge of your seat. This time around the nasties that kyle finds himself up against are zombies, or Barry's own take on the ever-popular monster at least. I have likened each of the books in the series so far to a genre of horror film, and this one is most definitely a tribute to zombie movies, even if Barry does stray from the traditional by making his zombies super-fast moving. I had a brief Twitter chat with Barry about this, and I know he shares my opinion that zombies should be slow moving. As such he instead christens then Screechers (as a result of the noise they make), and as it is their fast speed is fully justified. 

This is the penultimate book in the series and Barry uses it to treat us to a number of huge revelations, answering some of the questions that have been bouncing around in my brain ever since I first read Mr Mumbles. However, not ever loose end is tied off, and there is more to come in the final instalment, The Darkest Corners, scheduled for release in August of this year. This means that we are left on something of a cliffhanger at the end of The Beast, but Barry can be completely forgiven for this as I am sure he is setting us up for a truly epic finale to the story (no pressure Barry!). I for one can't wait to read it, although as I mentioned in yesterday's post there will be a certain degree of sadness that there will be no more Invisible Fiends books to look forward to again. This is definitely one of my favourite series of books for the 9+ age group of the past few years, if not of all time.

The Beast is scheduled to be released on 5th January, but it is already appearing in a number of stores, both online and in the high street. My thanks go to the lovely Rosi at HarperCollins for sending me a copy.

2012: The End of Days?

No, unlike many people I am not talking about the Mayan apocalypse prophecy. Instead I am referring to some of my favourite book series that are scheduled to come to an end in 2012. I'm a typical boy when it comes to reading - I love series books. In the past, before I started The Book Zone and I had a little more time on my hands, I would often re-read all the books in a series prior to a new instalment being published. I did this with Harry Potter, The Saga of Darren Shan and the original Percy Jackson series, amongst many others.


For me, a series coming to an end is usually a bitter-sweet experience. Sweet because it is great to finally come to the end of a much-loved and long-running story; bitter because it means that there will be no more. That's it. The End. With 2012 now upon us I know that I am going to experience those same emotions this year as several of my favourite series of recent years are coming to a close.

The first of these is M.G. Harris's truly amazing Joshua Files series. I have been reading (and loving) the ongoing adventures of Josh Garcia ever since the orange gel covered book screamed "Buy Me!" back in 2008. It is going to feel a little odd not having a new Joshua Files book to look forward to once the final book in the series, Apocalypse Moon, has been published in April. I know that M.G. has other projects in the pipeline, and if they are even only half as good as her Joshua Files books I will be queuing up to read them.


Another series scheduled for a conclusion this year, and not before time, is the final book in Anthony Horowitz's Power of Five series. There seems to be no end to this man's writing talent - Scorpia Rising was a mighty fine end to the Alex Rider series and I am sure that Anthony will bring P of F to an equally brilliant conclusion. He has warned over on his blog that "it has a pretty bleak conclusion" and also that it is twice as long as any book he has ever written. If you search that blog entry very carefully you will find a clue and then a link to the first chapter of The Power of Five: Oblivion.


One of my favourite series of the last couple of years has been Barry Hutchison's Invisible Fiends. Sadly this too is scheduled to be brought to a conclusion in August 2012, with the final book titled The Darkest Corners. I have already read the fifth book in the series, The Beast (released this week) and it is yet another great addition to this already fantastic horror series.


One of the current masters of boy-friendly series books also has a mini-series coming to an end in 2012. Of course, I am talking about Darren Shan, whose Saga of Larten Crepsely will end in May with Brothers To The Death. However, fans of Shan series will just about have time to get their breath back before his new Zom-B series hits the stores in September.


2012 is all about ending though (unless you believe that Mayan prophecy of course) as there are still many of my favourite series continuing beyond the next twelve months. There are two (yes, TWO) Wereworld books coming from the pen of Curtis Jobling; Rick Riordan has two more books scheduled, one from each of his two continuing series (Kane Chronicles and Heroes of Olympus); Alex Scarrow's TimeRiders series has at least one new addition due in 2012 (Gates of Rome in February); in March Will Hill's The Rising, the sequel to Department 19 will be unleashed on the world (I have read it - it is brilliant!); Robin Jarvis is back with Freax and Rejex, the follow-up to his jaw-droppingly brilliant Dancing Jax; and with any luck Andrew Lane will be treating his legion of fans to a fifth Young Sherlock book. Perhaps Henry Chancellor might finally release the final instalment of his Tom Scatterhorn trilogy? I will keep my fingers crossed but I'm not going to hold my breath as the release date for this has been pushed from 2010 to 2011 and now into 2012.


All in all, series wise it is looking like 2012 could be a great year for boy-friendly books, and I haven't even begun to mention brand new series from some of my other favourite authors, including Sarwat Chadda, David Gatward and Alexander Gordon Smith, to name a few.