It is ten years since the attack that reduced Pittsburgh to ashes. Today all that remains is the Archive: an interactive digital record of the city and its people. John Dominic Blaxton is a survivor, one of the ‘lucky ones’ who escaped the blast. Crippled by the loss of his wife and unborn daughter, he spends his days immersed in the Archive with the ghosts of yesterday. It is there he finds the digital record of a body: a woman, lying face down, half buried in mud. Who is she … and why is someone hacking into the system and deleting the record of her seemingly unremarkable life? This question will drag Dominic from the darkest corners of the past into a deadly and very present nightmare. When thousands die in a tragedy does the death of one more victim mean anything? That’s the jumping off point for Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Thomas Sweterlitsch. In near future America a bomb levels Pittsburgh. The entire US is consumed by grief at the scale of the atrocity. Using the latest technology to create a virtual representation of the city, an electronic archive is created to recapture all events in the city leading…

A bomb goes off in down town San Francisco. Twelve people are dead. But this is no ordinary target. This target exists on the fault line where sex and money meet. Daniel Madsen is one of a new breed of federal agents armed with a badge, a gun and the Bureau’s latest piece of technology. He’s a fast operator and his instructions are simple: find the bomber – and before he strikes again. In order to understand what is at stake, Madsen must plunge into a sleazy, unsettling world where reality and fantasy are indistinguishable, exploitation is business as usual, and the dead hand of corruption reaches all the way to the top. There’s too much money involved for this investigation to stay private. Skinjobs are the latest thing in adult entertainment, synthetic creations that flawlessly mimic humanity. They are starting to replace their organic forebears in the world’s oldest profession. When a “dollhouse” is destroyed in an act of terrorism, a federal agent and a CCTV operator are drawn into a shadowy conspiracy. Who is it that is trying to destroy the newest sector of America’s tech economy? Agent Daniel Madsen lives his job. He is at the forefront…

In 2014 humanity didn’t stand a chance. A series of fatal climatic disasters struck, entirely drowning the planet. Now, just one hundred and twenty-five souls remain, surviving on a flotilla of damaged ships. But their survival isn’t guaranteed. Facing severe threats to their numbers by a fatal bacterium and increasingly warring factions, they discover a serial killer within their midst. When the murderer targets Eva Morgan’s friend, her investigations draw her into a deadly mystery and a race against time before the killer’s actions destroy the fragile existence on the flotilla. The further she digs, the more secrets she uncovers, and the truth becomes a pawn in a game for ultimate survival.   Regular readers of The Eloquent Page will know that I can’t ever let an opportunity to revel in good apocalyptic fiction pass me by. I just love this devilish little sub-genre. I wish I could tell you exactly why, but in all honesty I’m not sure I can. All I know is that apocalyptic fiction really resonates with me, just can’t get enough of it. The latest work I’ve cast my beady eye over is SALT by Anachron Press supremo, Colin F Barnes. So let’s sit back,…

On the eve of the biggest storm in west coast history, virologist Fara McManus shows up at work in a secret government lab where microbiologist Dr. Jeremy Corcoran has been working on a new bioweapon, using the homeless as human guinea pigs. Concerned for the subjects, Fara decides to stay. Especially now. Between the raging storm outside and the rage-inducing chemicals in the patients, a million things could go wrong. But the last thing Fara expects to happen is an armed attack on the lab, an explosion of gunfire, and an army of men smashing the barriers. Releasing the infected. Spreading the virus…into the world. On a night like this, there is no shelter from the storm. At first glance you may be forgiven for thinking, based on the title alone, that this is a novelisation of a B-movie you’d normally find on the likes of the SyFy channel*. I’m certainly willing to admit that it was the slightly geeky sounding name that initially hooked me. That title, along with the book blurb above, conjures up all manner of weird and wonderful images. The big question though – does the book live up to this promise? The majority of the action…

A madman is on the rampage in the Los Angeles streets. The City of Angels has become The City of Fear. And everyone from the Oval Office down wants a quick result. The heat is on Jake Mottram, head of the FBI’s new Spree Killer Unit, and psychological profiler Angie Holmes to find the madman responsible.   Until now, they’ve been great together. Both at work and in bed. But a killer is about to come between them, in ways that could cost them far more than their careers. Will they survive the spree about to come? SPREE  Life and death in LA – like you’ve never seen it before. Jake and Angie are the flip sides of the same coin. Jake is all about taking direct action and instinct, while Angie focuses on analysis, introspection and investigation. Both of these approaches to solving cases have benefits but also failings. Their professional relationship sometimes throws up conflicts that spill over into their personal lives. Getting to see both individuals as more than just agents, but as human beings, gives a nice extra depth to the plot. Throughout the main narrative that features Angie and Jake, there are chapters from the killer’s perspective. The lunatic spree-killer is referred to only…

Thomas Schaefer is haunted by a memory. He has devoted a large part of his adult life to finding his kidnapped daughter. Since Amber’s disappearance ten years ago, Schaefer has become an expert in the recovery of missing people – his particular speciality is rescuing young adults from cults. When an old friend brings him a case that bears striking similarities to Amber’s kidnapping, Schaefer starts down a dark path that threatens his very existence. I like to mix up my genres as much as I possibly can. Last week I was reading an upbeat young adult urban fantasy, so this week I was looking for something a mite darker. I’ve always been a firm believer that thrillers and horror make for a good fit when you are mashing genres together. Cults, possession, dark magic and kidnapping are a fertile playground when it comes to thriller fiction. From the first page, Hamdy’s writing does a good job of giving us plenty of insight into Schaefer’s fragile, angry character. You quickly get the sense that you’re really getting under his skin. Thomas Schaefer is a man who has sacrificed everything, and I mean everything – his career, the rest of his family and…

Gosh, has it really already been twelve months since we all survived the Mayan apocalypse? It’s amazing how quickly we all forgot about that isn’t it? All those giant beasties, strange lights in the sky and everything. Crazy times, eh? Never mind, I’m sure there will another rapture-like event arriving imminently. While we’re waiting, why not pull up a chair and we can talk a bit about some of the top genre books that have arrived in the last year. I’ve decided, as I’ve done in the past, to hold an impromptu little awards ceremony. As ever the categories and winners are decided on by a crack team of intelligent, well-educated genre experts me. Here they are then, in no specific order, without any further rigmarole/needless waffle. Welcome Return of the Year Award – The Republic of Thieves delivered exactly the experience I was hoping for. I found myself getting happier and happier with each passing chapter. Just wonderful to have Locke Lamora, Jean Tannen and the other Gentlemen Bastards back. Great to see Scott Lynch’s return and to confirm he is still delivering exquisitely crafted fantasy. Character of the Year – Ack-Ack Macaque – This was a no brainer. C’mon people, he’s a cigar smoking, smart-mouthed simian who flies…

When a Senator’s daughter is kidnapped by a mysterious with ties to the supernatural, it’s clearly a job for SEAL Team 666. As Triple Six investigate, they discover links to the Zeta Cartel, a newly discovered temple beneath Mexico City, and a group known as followers of the Flayed One. But international politics. cross-border narco-terrorism, and an insidious force operating inside the team soon threaten to derail the mission. Forced to partner with several militant ex-patriots and a former Zeta hitman-turned-skinwalker, SEAL Team 666 is the world’s only hope to stop the return of the Age of Blood. Normally I tend to actively avoid starting a book when I know that it has predecessors that I’ve not yet read. I don’t like the idea that I’ve missed out on important character developments or plot points that may have an impact on what I’m reading. That said, there are always exceptions to every rule and in this particular instance I found myself powerless to resist the draw of this book. What a stonking premise, bonkers in the extreme – a group of hard-as-nails Navy SEALs tasked with taking on supernatural threats. The characters are all larger than life. Each of the…

WEWELSBURG CASTLE, 1940. The German war machine has woken an ancient threat – the alien Vril and their Ubermensch have returned. Ultimate Victory in the war for Europe is now within the Nazis’ grasp. ENGLAND, 1941 Foreign Office trouble shooter Guy Pentecross has stumbled into a conspiracy beyond his imagining – a secret war being waged in the shadows against a terrible enemy. The battle for Europe has just become the war for humanity.   I don’t read a massive amount of alternate history, but I have to admit that something about the premise of this novel immediately appealed to me. Secret Nazi schemes involving advanced alien races and the quest for the Nietzschean superman. A plot like that sounds as though it could certainly hold the promise of something entertaining. Rising against the Nazi/Vril threat are the men and women of Station Z, the British department who exist shrouded in the utmost secrecy. They are tasked with stopping Axis plans by any means necessary, even if that involves working with “the most evil man who ever lived”. There are also a handful of chapters that cover the action from the perspective of the Axis soldiers. These provide a nice…

A decade in the future, humanity thrives in the absence of sickness and disease. We owe our good health to a humble parasite – a genetically engineered tapeworm developed by the pioneering SymboGen Corporation. When implanted, the tapeworm protects us from illness, boosts our immune system – even secretes designer drugs. It’s been successful beyond the scientists’ wildest dreams. Now, years on, almost every human being has a SymboGen tapeworm living within them. But these parasites are getting restless. They want their own lives . . . and will do anything to get them. Sally ‘Sal’ Mitchell owes her life to an Intestinal Bodyguard™, a parasite that has allowed her to recover from a massively traumatic car accident. Without this medical miracle there is no way that Sal would have survived the severe injuries she sustained. Six years after the event and Sally has had to re-learn everything. Her life before the accident is gone, her memories a total blank. I was surprised how much this particular element of the story struck a chord with me. I’ve been in a very similar situation to Sal, minus the tapeworm I’m pleased to say, and I often ponder the person I was…

At an abandoned Soviet base in the Arctic, a battle to save all life on Earth is about to begin… THE SECRET BASE It is a top-secret base known only as Dragon Island. A long-forgotten relic of the Cold War, it houses a weapon of terrible destructive force, a weapon that has just been re-activated… AN ARMY OF MURDERERS When Dragon Island is seized by a brutal terrorist force calling itself the Army of Thieves, the fate of the world suddenly hangs in the balance. But there are no crack units close enough to get to Dragon in time to stop the Army setting off the weapon.  ONE SMALL TEAM Except, that is, for a small equipment-testing team up in the Arctic led by a Marine captain named Schofield, call-sign SCARECROW. It’s not a strike team; just a handful of Marines and civilians. It’s not equipped to attack a fortified island held by a small army. But it will go in anyway, because someone has to.  THE ULTIMATE HERO IS BACK, FACING THE ULTIMATE ARMY OF VILLAINS. Reviewing books can sometimes be a bit of a double-edged sword. On the plus side, I get to read some of the best…

1351 BC: Akhenaten the Sun-Pharaoh rules supreme in Egypt…until the day he casts off his crown and mysteriously disappears into the desert, his legacy seemingly swallowed up by the remote sands beneath the Great Pyramids of Giza. AD 1884: A British soldier serving in the Sudan stumbles upon an incredible discovery – a submerged temple containing evidence of a terrifying religion whose god was fed by human sacrifice. The soldier is on a mission to reach General Gordon before Khartoum falls. But he hides a secret of his own. Present day: Jack Howard and his team are excavating one of the most amazing underwater sites they have ever encountered, but dark forces are watching to see what they will find. Diving into the Nile, they enter a world three thousand years back in history, inhabited by a people who have sworn to guard the greatest secret of all time… Jack Howard is a modern day Indiana Jones type, part academic, part action man. Along with his friends and colleagues of the International Maritime University, he travels the globe uncovering facts behind myth and legend. His latest adventure finds him in Egypt and the Sudan attempting to track down the lost…

The world has turned its back on Japan: it has been economically devastated, thrown into political turmoil – and then attacked. A small team of highly trained, ruthless North Korean special forces troops invade the city of Fukuoka, holding the residents hostage. This is the vanguard of operation ‘From the Fatherland, with Love” – if nothing is done to stop them, 120,000 more troops will follow. And while the government seem incapable of acting, there is one possible source of resistance, a troubled gang of psychotic misfits, masters of guns, explosives and toxins, self-taught and unhinged. But they are driven only by the desire only by a desire for chaos and death. Based on the book blurb, From The Fatherland, With Love sounds like a standard by-the-numbers thriller, but that description couldn’t be further from the truth. This novel features an alternate vision of the Earth where things are subtly different. The brazen North Korean invasion-plan quickly gathers pace as the local authorities, rather ineffectually, run around like headless chickens allowing the Korean special forces to gain a foothold on Japanese soil. Things go from bad to worse as a second larger wave of troops arrive and the government still fails to…