I reluctantly put down my copy of One of Us by Craig Dilouie when I was finished. I just didn’t want that book to end. The story of “monster” children rejected by their families and society broke my heart and had me craving revolution. Ugh, it was so good. The icing on the novel cake was getting to interview the twisted mind that created Dog, Brain, and Goof… Mr. Craig DiLouie.

Check out my interview with the author here below.

One Of Us: A Novel
Hardcover | Kindle | Audiobook
By Craig DiLouie
Publisher: Orbit | Hachette Book Group
Release date: July 17, 2018

It is 1984 and the world is a strange one. A germ spread in the 1970s, causing genetic mutations in some of the children. Not harelips or six fingers or webbed toes, but fur and blobs, and upside down faces. These children are getting older and were put in a home, treated like slaves, unwanted and unloved. In a sleepy Georgia town, Enoch — or Dog, as he is called — just wants to belong, but hate and fear of the unknown will always keep him from being “One of Us.” When someone is murdered, it’s human (monster) against monster (human).

More below on One Of Us by Craig DiLouie.

Fellside
Hardcover | Kindle Edition
Written by M.R. Carey
Orbit Books | Hachette Book Group
Release Date: April 5th, 2016

Jess is a heroin addict, a burn victim, an amnesiac, and… a murderer. She does not really remember what happened, but she knows she must be guilty, even if it was not intentional. She feels so guilty she just wants to die – she deserves it. But something pulls her back… something so unbelievable that it gives her a spark of purpose in this hell of a prison, where most are corrupt on both sides of the law.

Alex Beech – the boy she befriended and burned.

Jess realizes she has the remarkable ability to enter the dreams of others, a talent she had forgotten about. It was “therapy’d” out of her as a kid. Alex shows her that place once again, as they try to figure out what really happened to him.

We try to figure it out too in Fellside by M.R. Carey.

More below.

Star Wars: A Galactic Pop-up Adventure
By Matthew Reinhart and Lucasfilm
Orchard Books/Hachette
Release Date: October 16, 2012

It’s a rare delight to find a product that can bring out the 8-year-old in even the most jaded adult. Star Wars: A Galactic Pop-up Adventure is a sure bet to send your mind spinning with child-like wonder. You’ll begin your journey of discovery in this book with a sense of amusement that quickly transitions into an immersive curiosity. Pop-ups lead to further pop-ups which occasionally cover even more pop-ups. This book is wonderfully engineered to keep you excavating eac page for more treasures.

The book serves as a high-level encyclopedia of the pre-Episode 4 Star Wars universe. The text is obviously not the draw here, but what’s included is informative and relevant. Each pop includes a brief history and background on the character, ship, or monster in question. The level of detail is impressive for a pop-up book that could just as easily say nothing and still sell incredibly well.

America Pacifica
Hardcover | Paperback | Kindle Edition
By Anna North
Reagan Arthur | Back Bay Books
Released June 2012

In Anna North‘s gritty dystopian, America Pacifica, eighteen-year-old Darcy lives with her mother on an island of the same name. It’s presumed to be one of the few inhabitable places to live after mainland America has entered a second ice age. The island was the brainchild of a legend named Tyson, who gathered up the first pilgrims from mainland America to restart society in a place where they could go outside again and not freeze to death.

Darcy knows little about America because her mother is sparse with the details of her past. All Darcy really knows is that her mother once lived in a co-op in Seattle before boarding a boat to America Pacifica and that her father is dead. When her mother doesn’t come home from work one night, Darcy sets out on a quest to find her, stopping at nothing and no one to get the answers she seeks. The problem is, for Darcy’s entire life, her mother has been the center of her universe, making her emotionally and socially dependent on her. This leaves Darcy ill-prepared to go out into the grimy, sleaze filled world and also the clean, privileged world of those who knew her mother in the time before the island.