Contagion by Erin Bowman

Title: Contagion
Author: Erin Bowman
Genre: Science Fiction, Horror
Source: HarperCollins
Goodreads

It got in us

After receiving an urgent SOS from a work detail on a distant planet, a skeleton crew is dispatched to perform a standard search-and-rescue mission.

Most are dead.

But when the crew arrives, they find an abandoned site, littered with rotten food, discarded weapons…and dead bodies.

Don't set foot here again.

As they try to piece together who—or what—could have decimated an entire operation, they discover that some things are best left buried—and some monsters are only too ready to awaken.

Review by Nara

Burning by Danielle Rollins

Title: Burning
Author: Danielle Rollins
Genre: Young Adult, Supernatural
Source: Bloomsbury
Goodreads

After three years in juvie, Angela Davis is now months away from release. She'll finally get the hell out of Brunesfield Correctional Facility.

And then Jessica arrives... she's young - only ten years old - so why did she arrive in shackles under the highest security? And why is she being kept in segregation? No one knows what she did to end up there. But there are plenty of rumours.

Pretty soon strange things start happening to Angela and her friends. Could they be down to Jessica?

This little girl might just be more dangerous than anyone expected...

Review by Nara

Review: The Girl with All the Gifts by M.R. Carey

Title: The Girl with All the Gifts
Author: M.R. Carey
Genre: Adult, Horror, Science Fiction, Post-Apocalyptic
Source: Bookworld
Goodreads | The Reading Room

Melanie is a very special girl. Dr Caldwell calls her 'our little genius'. Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes that she won't bite, but they don't laugh. Melanie loves school. She loves learning about spelling and sums and the world outside the classroom and the children's cells. She tells her favourite teacher all the things she'll do when she grows up. Melanie doesn't know why this makes Miss Justineau look sad.

Review by Nara

Review: Sea of Shadows by Kelley Armstrong

Title: Sea of Shadows
Author: Kelley Armstrong
Genre: Young Adult, High Fantasy, Horror
Release Date: 8 April, 2014
Source: HarperTeen via Edelweiss. Thank you!

Average Goodreads rating: 3.64 out of 5.00 (180+ ratings)
Goodreads | The Reading Room

In the Forest of the Dead, where the empire’s worst criminals are exiled, twin sisters Moria and Ashyn are charged with a dangerous task. For they are the Keeper and the Seeker, and each year they must quiet the enraged souls of the damned.

Only this year, the souls will not be quieted.

Ambushed and separated by an ancient evil, the sisters’ journey to find each other sends them far from the only home they’ve ever known. Accompanied by a stubborn imperial guard and a dashing condemned thief, the girls cross a once-empty wasteland, now filled with reawakened monsters of legend, as they travel to warn the emperor. But a terrible secret awaits them at court—one that will alter the balance of their world forever.

Review by Nara

Review: White Space by Ilsa J Bick

Title: White Space (Dark Passages #1)
Author: Ilsa J Bick
Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal Fantasy, Horror
Source: EgmontUSA via Edelweiss. Thank you!

Goodreads rating: 2.92 out of 5.00 (70+ ratings)
Goodreads | The Reading Room

In the tradition of Memento and Inception comes a thrilling and scary young adult novel about blurred reality where characters in a story find that a deadly and horrifying world exists in the space between the written lines.

Seventeen-year-old Emma Lindsay has problems: a head full of metal, no parents, a crazy artist for a guardian whom a stroke has turned into a vegetable, and all those times when she blinks away, dropping into other lives so ghostly and surreal it's as if the story of her life bleeds into theirs. But one thing Emma has never doubted is that she's real.

Then she writes "White Space," a story about these kids stranded in a spooky house during a blizzard.

Unfortunately, "White Space" turns out to be a dead ringer for part of an unfinished novel by a long-dead writer. The manuscript, which she's never seen, is a loopy Matrix meets Inkheart story in which characters fall out of different books and jump off the page. Thing is, when Emma blinks, she might be doing the same and, before long, she's dropped into the very story she thought she'd written. Trapped in a weird, snow-choked valley, Emma meets other kids with dark secrets and strange abilities: Eric, Casey, Bode, Rima, and a very special little girl, Lizzie. What they discover is that they--and Emma--may be nothing more than characters written into being from an alternative universe for a very specific purpose.

Now what they must uncover is why they've been brought to this place--a world between the lines where parallel realities are created and destroyed and nightmares are written--before someone pens their end.

Review by Nara

Review: Red Hill by Jamie McGuire

Title: Red Hill
Author: Jamie McGuire
Genre: Adult, Horror
Source: Simon & Schuster Australia. Thank you!

Goodreads rating: 4.05 out of 5.00 (2,000+ ratings)
Goodreads | The Reading Room

When the world ends, can love survive?

For Scarlet, raising her two daughters alone makes fighting for tomorrow an everyday battle. Nathan has a wife, but can’t remember what it’s like to be in love; only his young daughter Zoe makes coming home worthwhile. Miranda’s biggest concern is whether her new VW Bug is big enough to carry her sister and their boyfriends on a weekend escape from college finals.

When reports of a widespread, deadly “outbreak” begin to surface, these ordinary people face extraordinary circumstances and suddenly their fates are intertwined. Recognizing they can’t outrun the danger, Scarlet, Nathan, and Miranda desperately seek shelter at the same secluded ranch, Red Hill. Emotions run high while old and new relationships are tested in the face of a terrifying enemy—an enemy who no longer remembers what it’s like to be human.

Set against the backdrop of a brilliantly realized apocalyptic world, love somehow finds a way to survive. But what happens when the one you’d die for becomes the one who could destroy you?

Red Hill grabs you from page one and doesn’t let go until its stunning conclusion. This is #1 New York Times bestselling author Jamie McGuire at her unforgettable best.

Review by Nara

Horror October: Recommended Ghostly Reads

So for the second post as a part of Horror October, I thought I'd recommend some of the good ghost books I've read. Because you can't go past horror and Halloween and what not without ghosts. Oh, and if you missed the first introduction post I did with Chantelle here you go.

Horror October: Random Discussions About Horror

If you haven't heard of Horror October before, basically, it's an event organised by the lovely Leanne (WHO IS A FLIPPING PASTRY CHEF!) at Literary Excursion to celebrate everything horror- books, movies, whatever. So, to kick off Horror Month, in this incredibly riveting *cough* discussion that Chantelle and I had, we contemplate what makes a book scary, the books we've read that actually fit the genre of horror and other such things.