Lead stories from SPR’s ever-growing independent book portal
Review: The Bird Room by Chad Hofmann
“It’s too late for him too, said the man in a high-pitched voice, drooling in anticipation, like a dog with a bone. Eli stood frozen, his brain issued a hundred different commands that his body would not obey. The man let out bone chilling cackle and, with lightning quickness, sunk the blade of the scalpel into Eli’s left thigh. The pain hit Eli like a train and he was instantly brought back to reality. He looked over at the parrot, who was now calm and quiet. Its mysterious gray eyes connected with Eli’s, and he felt as if […]
The final book in the Galadria fantasy trilogy is the shortest of the three novels but it packs quite the punch. Galadria: Peter Huddleston and the Knights of the Leaf starts right where the author left the readers hanging in the sequel. The previous book ended abruptly with a powerful cliffhanger, abandoning Peter in the midst of a battle with Knor of the House of Shadowray.
Dylan Prescott’s life hasn’t been easy. Her parents died in a car accident. A boy in middle school played a nasty trick on her. During her childhood she’d been the victim of pranks and rumors.
Apart from a few suicides over the past couple years, the small North Carolina town of Crow Creek is of little note to anyone outside of its residents – friendly, well-acquainted – and while sad news will always rock a community, life goes on for the people within it. That is until the day a sinkhole swallows up a mother and child along with half a football pitch of land, and some residents suddenly have a reason to think that their private suspicions might have common ground, as strange as it may be.
Return of the Clonsayee is the second part of the Xidoran Prophecy series by Elaine Bassett.
Charles Brookfield was just an ordinary boy with a life in the country that left him wanting for nothing. That is, until his fifteenth birthday. With a gift of a set of coins, his family leaves Charles heir to an unbelievable secret and a whole new world, one so dangerous that Caroline – the only girl he ever felt right about – must never be exposed, no matter how much the world of the Sojourners may intrude upon their lives. What follows is an epic tale of magic and intrigue for the best summer Charles has ever had.
Tyler Cipriani is a programming prodigy and prodigal son to two brilliant parents – a pushy philosopher-scientist who even used Tyler for his own studies growing up, and a mathematics professor whose ambition and love for her son overlap with her bitterness at her now-ex-husband. His life is by no means average, but despite his talent (whether natural or induced) he holds himself back from a proper education and the constant offers of work in his field, insisting on dreams of bike trips and a period of self-exploration.