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Fiction and Excerpts [8]
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Fiction and Excerpts [8]

The Dogs of Athens

Wed Sep 9, 2015 9:00am
Edited by: Melissa Frain
14 Favorites [+]
, || “The Dogs of Athens” by Kendare Blake is a dark story set before the events of the Goddess Wars series for young adults during the twilight of the gods. Greek goddess Artemis and her immortal companions have returned to modern-day Athens where a chance reunion with Actaeon, the mortal hero who fell prey to Artemis' fatal wrath thousands of years ago, turns violent once again.

Five Great Reads Featuring Creepy Ass Water

Tue Sep 20, 2016 11:00am 19 comments 1 Favorite [+]

It occurs to me that I should change the title to “Five Great Reads Featuring Creepy Ass Bodies of Water,” to avoid confusion. But I don’t know of any books that feature ass water at all, and that they would be creepy if they did would go without saying, so I’m going to leave it as is.

Thank you for joining me today, as I push upon you five of my favorite reads that somehow star creepy water. Ominous water. Malevolent liquid. You get the idea. But how can water be creepy, you may be asking, hopefully not out loud because I am not there and cannot actually hear you. Water is nice. We need it. It’s pretty in all those shots of sparkly sunsets and old people fishing on some lake up north wearing those hats with hooks in them and talking about Sally Ann and how she makes the best coffee. And sure, that is nice, on the surface.

[Underneath, though…]

Series: Five Books About…

The Dogs of Athens

Wed Sep 9, 2015 9:00am 2 comments 14 Favorites [+]

“The Dogs of Athens” by Kendare Blake is a dark story set before the events of the Goddess Wars series for young adults during the twilight of the gods. Greek goddess Artemis and her immortal companions have returned to modern-day Athens where a chance reunion with Actaeon, the mortal hero who fell prey to Artemis’ fatal wrath thousands of years ago, turns violent once again.

[Read “The Dogs of Athens” by Kendare Blake]

When Gods and Vampires Roamed Miami

Tue Sep 16, 2014 9:00am 6 comments 6 Favorites [+]

“When Gods and Vampires Roamed Miami” is the story of when immortal teen goddess Athena is mistaken for a vampire by a desperate youth who refuses to leave her side until she turns him. This tale takes place in the world of the Goddess Wars series for young adults by award-winning author Kendare Blake.

This short story was acquired and edited for Tor.com by senior editor Melissa Frain.

[Read “When Gods and Vampires Roamed Miami” by Kendare Blake]

Mortal Gods (Excerpt)

Fri Sep 12, 2014 2:00pm Post a comment Favorite This

Ares, god of war, is leading the other dying gods into battle. Which is just fine with Athena. She’s ready to wage a war of her own, and she’s never liked him anyway. If Athena is lucky, the winning gods will have their immortality restored. If not, at least she’ll have killed the bloody lot of them, and she and Hermes can die in peace.

Cassandra Weaver is a weapon of fate. The girl who kills gods. But all she wants is for the god she loved and lost to return to life. If she can’t have that, then the other gods will burn, starting with his murderer, Aphrodite. The alliance between Cassandra and Athena is fragile. Cassandra suspects Athena lacks the will to truly kill her own family. And Athena fears that Cassandra’s hate will get them all killed.

The war takes them across the globe, searching for lost gods, old enemies, and Achilles, the greatest warrior the world has ever seen. As the struggle escalates, Athena and Cassandra must find a way to work together. Because if they can’t, fates far worse than death await.

Gideon Smith amazon buy linkMortal Gods, the second Goddess War novel by Kendare Blake, is available October 14th from Tor Teen.

[Read an excerpt]

3 of the Biggest Overreactions in Greek Mythology

Tue Aug 19, 2014 12:30pm 23 comments 1 Favorite [+]
Painting by Theodoor Rombouts, early 17th century

Life was hard in ancient times. You had to farm for stuff, and then turn that stuff you farmed into food and cook it without a microwave.  And sometimes, you had to put a garland around the neck of the best thing you farmed that year, and slaughter it on an altar, or in the middle of your tiny town square or whatever, because gods don’t farm and eff you very much they feel like some bull today.

The point is times were hard. People were cranky. Gods were smitey. Rage was on a whole other level. Or it must have been, because that’s the only reason I can figure for these huge, flaming reactions of batshit crazy.

[Read More]

Antigoddess (Excerpt)

Wed Aug 7, 2013 2:00pm Post a comment Favorite This

Check out Antigoddess, the first installment of the new Goddess War series by Kendare Blake, available Septeber 10th!

Old Gods never die. Or so Athena thought. But then the feathers started sprouting beneath her skin, invading her lungs like a strange cancer, and Hermes showed up with a fever eating away his flesh. So much for living a quiet eternity in perpetual health.

Desperately seeking the cause of their slow, miserable deaths, Athena and Hermes travel the world, gathering allies and discovering enemies both new and old. Their search leads them to Cassandra—an ordinary girl who was once an extraordinary prophetess, protected and loved by a god. 

These days, Cassandra doesn’t involve herself in the business of gods—in fact, she doesn’t even know they exist. But she could be the key in a war that is only just beginning…

[Read more]

Series: YA on Tor.com

Girl of Nightmares, Chapter Two (Excerpt)

Thu Aug 2, 2012 10:00am 3 comments 1 Favorite [+]

The sequel to Kendare Blake’s Anna Dressed in Blood is coming on August 7th, but that’s not fast enough. We’ve shown you chapter one, and you deserve a second boost for waiting all this time — here’s chapter two of Girl of Nightmares!:

It’s been months since the ghost of Anna Korlov opened a door to Hell in her basement and disappeared into it, but ghost-hunter Cas Lowood can’t move on.

His friends remind him that Anna sacrificed herself so that Cas could live—not walk around half dead. He knows they’re right, but in Cas’s eyes, no living girl he meets can compare to the dead girl he fell in love with.

Now he’s seeing Anna everywhere: sometimes when he’s asleep and sometimes in waking nightmares. But something is very wrong…these aren’t just daydreams. Anna seems tortured, torn apart in new and ever more gruesome ways every time she appears.

Cas doesn’t know what happened to Anna when she disappeared into Hell, but he knows she doesn’t deserve whatever is happening to her now. Anna saved Cas more than once, and it’s time for him to return the favor.

[Read more]

Series: Girls’ Nightmare Out

Girl of Nightmares (Excerpt)

Wed May 30, 2012 11:15am Post a comment Favorite This

The sequel to Kendare Blake’s Anna Dressed in Blood is coming on August 7th, but we’ve got something to help make the wait seem a little shorter — the first chapter of Girl of Nightmares! Take a look:

It’s been months since the ghost of Anna Korlov opened a door to Hell in her basement and disappeared into it, but ghost-hunter Cas Lowood can’t move on.

His friends remind him that Anna sacrificed herself so that Cas could live—not walk around half dead. He knows they’re right, but in Cas’s eyes, no living girl he meets can compare to the dead girl he fell in love with.

Now he’s seeing Anna everywhere: sometimes when he’s asleep and sometimes in waking nightmares. But something is very wrong…these aren’t just daydreams. Anna seems tortured, torn apart in new and ever more gruesome ways every time she appears.

Cas doesn’t know what happened to Anna when she disappeared into Hell, but he knows she doesn’t deserve whatever is happening to her now. Anna saved Cas more than once, and it’s time for him to return the favor.

[Read more]

Series: Girls’ Nightmare Out

Anna Dressed in Blood (New Excerpt)

Tue May 22, 2012 5:00pm Post a comment Favorite This

Anna Dressed in Blood is coming out in paperback on July 3rd! To celebrate, we’re extending the excerpt here on Tor.com — you can now read the first two chapters of the book!:

Cas Lowood has inherited an unusual vocation: He kills the dead.

So did his father before him, until he was gruesomely murdered by a ghost he sought to kill. Now, armed with his father’s mysterious and deadly athame, Cas travels the country with his kitchen-witch mother and their spirit-sniffing cat. They follow legends and local lore, destroy the murderous dead, and keep pesky things like the future and friends at bay.

Searching for a ghost the locals call Anna Dressed in Blood, Cas expects the usual: track, hunt, kill. What he finds instead is a girl entangled in curses and rage, a ghost like he’s never faced before. She still wears the dress she wore on the day of her brutal murder in 1958: once white, now stained red and dripping with blood. Since her death, Anna has killed any and every person who has dared to step into the deserted Victorian she used to call home.

Yet she spares Cas’s life.

[Read more]

Anna Dressed in Blood (Excerpt)

Mon Jun 13, 2011 12:30pm 8 comments Favorite This

Please enjoy this excerpt from Anna Dressed in Blood, out on August 30th from Tor Teen. This is the book that Holly Black and Cassandra Clare have been raving about on Twitter, and we’re smitten, too!

***

Chapter One

The grease-slicked hair is a dead giveaway—no pun intended.

So is the loose and faded leather coat, though not as much that as the sideburns. And the way he keeps nodding and flicking his Zippo open and closed in rhythm with his head. He belongs in a chorus line of dancing Jets and Sharks.

Then again, I have an eye for these things. I know what to look for, because I’ve seen just about every variety of spook and spectre you can imagine. The hitchhiker haunts a stretch of winding North Carolina road, bordered by unpainted split-rail fences and a whole lot of nothing. Unsuspecting drivers probably pick him up out of boredom, thinking he’s just some college kid who reads too much Kerouac.

[Read more]

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