3 4 Friday: disappearance, life lessons and psychic powers - terrific teen reads

This Friday, we've been drawn back to one of our favourite areas of the shop - teen fiction. We continue to be impressed at the great books coming out for teens - from paranormal fantasy to contemporary fiction able to cut it with the mainstream.

So for today's '3 4 Friday' #FridayReads here are our favourite teen reads:

In 'Blackwood' author Gwenda Bond takes a real-life mystery and turns it into a paranormal mystery thriller that both teens and adults will enjoy. In an island community in the US the local theatre recreates for the tourists a performance all about how 114 of its residents - early settlers to the States - simply disappeared. Now it looks like history is about to repeat itself. Can a girl who thinks she was born with a curse and a boy who thinks he can hear the voices of the dead save the townsfolk from their strange fate? Miranda Blackwood who has always been shunned as an outsider must take on alchemy and witchcraft to put a stop to a curse that goes back hundreds of years. A gripping story that uses a real-life mystery to great effect to create an atmospheric explanation of a haunting mystery.

(‘Blackwood’ - published by Strange Chemistry - is part of the CloneFiles initiative. Buy the book, get the eBook free)

If your taste (or your teen child’s taste, ahem) is more for real life contemporary fiction, there have been a few stand-out titles recently. But one of our favourites, both for the moving subject it deals with (but not so much that it’s depressing!) and the fantastic writing is ‘How to Save a Life’ by Sara Zarr.

This is a beautiful story about what it means to be a family. Jill is struggling to deal both with the death of her father 10 months ago, and now the pregnant girl her mum has brought into the house whose baby she plans to adopt. Mandy feels lost and lonely and doesn't know what she should do with her life, or what's really right for her and the baby. Neither girl is sure of who they are anymore and how they fit in.

Ellie says "A terrifically moving story for teens as these two girls learn to let go and move on as their world's change dramatically around them. I read this in a day it was so compelling and it was beautifully done - nothing felt forced or unreal. A brilliant read.".

Our last title is ‘Raven Boys’ by Maggie Stiefvater, a book that falls between the paranormal and contemporary genres. There are psychics who can see things in the future, but their forecasts are sufficiently vague to still fit in with the real world and whilst the ‘quest’ of the main characters crosses the border to the paranormal, it’s roots are in an old legend (and legends and myths are a part of our history today).

When Blue, a psychic's daughter but with no powers herself, sees a spirit for the first time, it leads her to 4 boys from the local private school Aglionby. She's soon caught up in their quest to find Glendower - a lost ancient Welsh king who will grant supernatural favour to whoever finds him, and it is this mystery that is at the core of the book. But where will their quest lead them and what will be the consequences?

This was an excellent start to a series - the characterisation was really well done and the boys especially were particularly complex and layered characters that made them compelling parts of the story. The plot line was quite different and interesting and Stiefvater tells a fab story without the usual cliff-hanger at the end but with the story far from finished and more mysteries remaining...

3 4 Friday - Costumed Capers, Urban Fantasy and Clonefiles Mayhem

To celebrate the launch of the Angry Robot Clonefiles Initiative our '3 4 Friday' this week are three staff picks from their fantastic science fiction and fantasy list. It's hard to believe that Angry Robot only launched in July 2009, but already have a huge and passionate fanbase, a reputation for some of the best new writing, not to mention scooping an Arthur C Clarke Award for Lauren Beukes‘ novel Zoo City last year.

 

So - in case you hadn't heard - anyone buying an Angry Robot title through Mostly Books will be able to get hold of an e-book of that title absolutely free. In whatever format you require. How cool is that?

Here are three staff favourites from the shelves:

The Damned Busters by Matthew Hughes

When mild-mannered actuary Chesney Artstruther refuses to sell his soul to the devil, the whole of hell goes on strike. And without the thought of hell to spur on mankind things begin to look serious for the planet and Chesney gets the chance to do a deal with the devil.  

"Chock full of humour, this is a fantastic romp with superheroes, Satan and a strike in hell...an interesting concept and a mismatched duo of costumed, crime fighting hero and demon sidekick make for an hilarious novel. This book is perfect for fans of Tom Holt and Robert Rankin." - Ellie 
 

Dead Harvest by Chris F Holm

Sam Thornton is a collector of souls. When he goes to collect the soul of Kate, a young multiple murderer, he becomes convinced that she is innocent and refuses to do his duty. He is soon on the run from the forces of both Heaven and Hell, trying to prevent a calamity of apocalyptic proportions. With its retro cover it’s not surprising that although this is gritty, urban fantasy, it is also owes a lot to the noir crime genre and is a good twist on both genres.

"One of my favourite Angry Robot titles, simply because of the excellent first-person writing and characterisation that places you at the heart of the tale - not to mention loads of great references to . And that cover is retro, and very desirable - just the kind of book that you want to own, and read digitally, so made for the Clonefiles initiative!" - Mark

Sixty-One Nails by Mike Shevdon

When Niall Petersen suffers a suspected heart attack on the London Underground he is healed by a woman who tells him the incident has woken latent Feyre powers. He learns of the hidden world of the Feyre, an uncanny place of legend that lurks just beyond the surface of everyday life. The ancient peoples are at war - but is Niall really the one who can wield the dark magic of the Untainted, and save them all?

"This is a great myth-based urban fantasy series that will appeal to Neil Gaiman fans. A new, fresh voice in the genre!" -Julia

To order Angry Robot titles, pop into Mostly Books - or view a larger list of titles which can be ordered online here.

eBooks - the indies strike back?

We are always getting excited about things in this shop - mostly it's about books (of course), or events or possibly a conversation we've had with a customer, or even an author.

But the conversations we have with publishers are often the most exciting. Months later, when a book is doing particularly well, or we are basking in the glory of a big event, it can be traced back to a conversation we've had with a publisher months earlier.

But a few weeks ago an ad hoc chat with publisher Angry Robot has yielded an initiative that in some ways is the most exciting thing we've ever done. It's certainly one of the most innovative - and allows us to start playing in an area that, hitherto, we have been a rather anxious spectator. eBooks.

It's called the Clonefiles Initiative and, with a few specific details involving timings, basically you buy an Angry Robot title at Mostly Books - you get the eBook free. And that's for *any* reader.

Pretty exciting, huh? We think so. More over on the Angry Robot website, or read our full press release here...

We'll have plenty more on this over the coming days, but we'd love to know what you think, and we hope other indies will follow suit...

(Update - we now have a curated collection of our top ten Angry Robot titles, as chosen by the Mostly Books staff)