A novel of vampires, werewolves and mummies

Last but not least in the Parasol Protectrate series is Timeless:

Alexia Tarabotti, Lady Maccon, has settled into domestic bliss. Of course, being Alexia, such bliss involves integrating werewolves into London High society, living in a vampire's second best closet, and coping with a precocious toddler who is prone to turning supernatural willy-nilly. Even Ivy Tunstell's acting troupe's latest play, disastrous to say the least, cannot put a damper on Alexia's enjoyment of her new London lifestyle.

Until, that is, she receives a summons from Alexandria that cannot be ignored. With husband, child, and Tunstells in tow, Alexia boards a steamer to cross the Mediterranean. But Egypt may hold more mysteries than even the indomitable Lady Maccon can handle. What does the vampire Queen of the Alexandria Hive really want from her? Why is the God-Breaker Plague suddenly expanding? And how has Ivy Tunstell suddenly become the most popular actress in all the British Empire?

Sadly, that the end of the Parasol Protectorate series. But author Gail Carriger is starting another series next year about a Finishing School, and then starting a Parasol Protectorate Abroad series!

A novel of vampires, werewolves and teapots

Today I am posting about the fourth book in Gail Carriger's Parasol Protectorate series, Heartless:

Lady Alexia Maccon, soulless, is at it again, only this time the trouble is not her fault. When a mad ghost threatens the queen, Alexia is on the case, following a trail that leads her deep into her husband's past. Top that off with a sister who has joined the suffragette movement (shocking!), Madame Lefoux's latest mechanical invention, and a plague of zombie porcupines and Alexia barely has time to remember she happens to be eight months pregnant.

Will Alexia manage to determine who is trying to kill Queen Victoria before it is too late? Is it the vampires again or is there a traitor lurking about in wolf's clothing? And what, exactly, has taken up residence in Lord Akeldama's second best closet?

A novel of vampires, werewolves & unexpected surprises

I am continuing to spread the word about Gail Carriger's delightful Parasol Protectorate books. Today is Blameless:

Quitting her husband's house and moving back in with her horrible family, Lady Maccon becomes the scandal of the London season.

Queen Victoria dismisses her from the Shadow Council, and the only person who can explain anything, Lord Akeldama, unexpectedly leaves town. To top it all off, Alexia is attacked by homicidal mechanical ladybugs, indicating, as only ladybugs can, the fact that all of London's vampires are now very much interested in seeing Alexia quite thoroughly dead.

While Lord Maccon elects to get progressively more inebriated and Professor Lyall desperately tries to hold the Woolsey werewolf pack together, Alexia flees England for Italy in search of the mysterious Templars. Only they know enough about the preternatural to explain her increasingly inconvenient condition, but they may be worse than the vampires -- and they're armed with pesto.

I strongly encourage you to read the books in order. They'll make much more sense that way.

A novel of werewolves, vampires and dirigibles

Momma, GrandMomma and I are now thoroughly addicted to the Parasol Protectorate books by Gail Carriger.

Alexia Tarabotti, the Lady Woolsey, awakens in the wee hours of the mid-afternoon to find her husband, who should be decently asleep like any normal werewolf, yelling at the top of his lungs. Then he disappears - leaving her to deal with a regiment of supernatural soldiers encamped on her doorstep, a plethora of exorcised ghosts, and an angry Queen Victoria. 

But Alexia is armed with her trusty parasol, the latest fashions, and an arsenal of biting civility. Even when her investigations take her to Scotland, the backwater of ugly waistcoats, she is prepared: upending werewolf pack dynamics as only the soulless can.

She might even find time to track down her wayward husband, if she feels like it.

Momma galloped through all five books in three days, and GrandMomma is following close behind.

Thank heavens there's both Kindle and Audible versions or I might never get my mitts upon them!

American gothic

Warner Bros.

You can now officially count me as a Johnny Depp/Tim Burton fan.

Those two wild and crazy guys have collaborated on some of my all-time favorite moving pictures:

• Edward Scissorhands (1990)
• Ed Wood (1994)
• Sleepy Hollow (1999)
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)
• Corpse Bride (2005)
• Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)
• Alice in Wonderland (2010)

And now Dark Shadows, which is scheduled to be released on May 11:

In the year 1752, Joshua and Naomi Collins, with young son Barnabas, set sail from Liverpool, England to start a new life in America. But even an ocean was not enough to escape the mysterious curse that has plagued their family. Two decades pass and Barnabas has the world at his feet-or at least the town of Collinsport, Maine. The master of Collinwood Manor, Barnabas is rich, powerful and an inveterate playboy...until he makes the grave mistake of breaking the heart of Angelique Bouchard. A witch, in every sense of the word, Angelique dooms him to a fate worse than death: turning him into a vampire, and then burying him alive. Two centuries later, Barnabas is inadvertently freed from his tomb and emerges into the very changed world of 1972. He returns to Collinwood Manor to find that his once-grand estate has fallen into ruin. The dysfunctional remnants of the Collins family have fared little better...

Dark Shadows was an American-produced gothic soap opera that originally aired weekdays from 1966 to 1971. The original story did not mention any supernatural elements. It was unprecedented in daytime television when ghosts were introduced about six months after it began.

The series became hugely popular when vampire Barnabas Collins appeared a year into its run. Dark Shadows also featured werewolves, zombies, man-made monsters, witches, warlocks, time travel, and a parallel universe.

I. Can't. Wait.

The Parasol Protectorate

Ahh, I have discovered yet another use for my Unusually Stout Parasol.

Alexia Tarabotti is laboring under a great many social tribulations. 

First, she has no soul. Second, she's a spinster whose father is both Italian and dead. Third, she was rudely attacked by a vampire, breaking all standards of social etiquette.

Where to go from there? From bad to worse apparently, for Alexia accidentally kills the vampire -- and then the appalling Lord Maccon (loud, messy, gorgeous, and werewolf) is sent by Queen Victoria to investigate.

With unexpected vampires appearing and expected vampires disappearing, everyone seems to believe Alexia responsible. Can she figure out what is actually happening to London's high society? Will her soulless ability to negate supernatural powers prove useful or just plain embarrassing? Finally, who is the real enemy, and do they have treacle tart?

To find out the new use for my Unusually Stout Parasol, read Soulless by Gail Carriger. Set in Victorian London, it's full of werewolves, vampires, dirigibles, and tea-drinking.

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself

Why do we fear those who are different?

http://harrypotter.warnerbros.com/undesirable/deploy/index.html

Why?

I was thinking about that this weekend as I reread Little Women and Werewolves, watched Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2, and read an interesting book called Shadow of the Quarter Moon.

We have So Much to learn from one another. Just think where we could be both as a Society and as a World if we could stop fearing differentness and start embracing it.

Maybe then we could stop these Wars.

Until then, I guess you'll just have to call Me Undesirable No. 1, because I intend to embrace the different and unknown.

My smelling salts again, please

This time I think I truly shall swoon.

Porter Grand, the co-author of my aforementioned Little Women and Werewolves, has put her stamp of approval on My bookmobile flag!

I am off to find more books for the "fiercest of book collections." 

Any recommendations? 

The classics, going-to-be

Momma's home sick with Weak Lungs so I went to the library to get some books to read to her.
 
The Classics.

Miss Sparrow went to the shelves and returned with an armful of books.

She handed them to Me one by one. 

Little Women and Werewolves, by Louisa May Alcott. Classic.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, by Jane Austen. Classic. 

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, by Jane Austen. Classic. 

Android Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy. Classic. 

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, by Seth Grahame-Smith. Classic, going-to-be.

She was laughing and so was I.

"You don't need to read them all today," Miss Sparrow said.

Ha! (Or should I say, "Mwahaha!"?)

Maybe after Momma goes to sleep?

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I got Momma a copy of Dick and Jane and Vampires since she's just learning to read. 

That should put her to sleep.

With apologies to Maud Hart Lovelace
and her delightful book, Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown.