Wednesday, May 20, 2020

What We're Reading #51

Treat yourselt to some new books! Here are a few recommendations to get you started.

River of Souls by T.L. Bodine

River of Souls by T. L. Bodine

Undeath is a manageable condition.

That’s what the media says, anyway: with the help of the miracle life-extension drug, Lazarus, the Undead can retain their humanity and live normal, happy lives. Without it, they become violent, mindless walking corpses.

Davin Montoya was eager to believe all of that. Forced to drop out of college to take care of his teenage sister, Zoe, after their father drank himself to death, he was more than happy to sign the no-good alcoholic over to the government’s Lazarus House for treatment. That was one less thing for him to worry about.

Until an accident left him joining the ranks of the freshly deceased himself.

Now, keeping his death a secret is the only way to keep his sister out of foster care. But to do so, he must venture into the underground society of Unregistered Undead – a dangerous world of drug deals and government resistance. But when their access to Lazarus begins to run dry, the truth starts to unravel…and it’s not what anyone expected. 

Goodreads | Amazon

Alex’s Teaser Review

This story has compassion. It has heart. It is unique and also can be seen as a reflection for some current political times.

Read Alex’s entire review at Goodreads.

The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa

A haunting Orwellian novel about the terrors of state surveillance, from the acclaimed author of The Housekeeper and the Professor.

On an unnamed island off an unnamed coast, objects are disappearing: first hats, then ribbons, birds, roses—until things become much more serious. Most of the island’s inhabitants are oblivious to these changes, while those few imbued with the power to recall the lost objects live in fear of the draconian Memory Police, who are committed to ensuring that what has disappeared remains forgotten.

When a young woman who is struggling to maintain her career as a novelist discovers that her editor is in danger from the Memory Police, she concocts a plan to hide him beneath her floorboards. As fear and loss close in around them, they cling to her writing as the last way of preserving the past.

A surreal, provocative fable about the power of memory and the trauma of loss, The Memory Police is a stunning new work from one of the most exciting contemporary authors writing in any language.

Goodreads | Amazon

Audra’s Teaser Review

I have been intrigued by this one ever since I first saw the cover. But even better, that amazing cover perfectly encapsulates what this book is about. It is a wonderful and quite dark contemplation on what memory means and how it not only makes us who we are as individuals, but also how it makes us exist as human.

Read Audra’s entire review at Goodreads.

Hexis by Charlene Elsby

I’m not relentless. “Relentless” makes it sound like there’s something called “relent” and that I’m lacking it. In that sense, I’m not relentless, but perhaps I’m unrelenting. I could relent if I wanted to. But he always has to die. I mean “always” in two senses: at all times and all of the time. I can’t kill him all of the time. That would take too long. But all of the times I did, I did. I’d do it again. I could relent if I wanted to, but instead I’d do it again. If he’s different, then he’s the same and if he’s the same, he’s got to go. If he were different and not the same, then there would be two things and I’d only have to kill one of them. If only I only had to kill one of him. What a life I would live, if only I only had to kill him the one time. But death doesn’t always do him in. 

Goodreads | Amazon

Tracy’s Teaser Review

Charlene Elsby’s debut novella, Hexis, is as dense and heavy as both Pasternak and Kundera’s books. It’s a head trip of love, loss, hatred, and murder.

Read Tracy’s entire review at Scifi and Scary.

Thank you for joining us today! We hope you found something to add to your tbr list. Please share your recent reads with us in the comments below.

If you are a LOHF writer and have a book you’d like us to consider for a review please visit our review submission page here.

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