Library Journal's Readers Shelf-Halloween Fiction

The Reader's Shelf

From Library Journal

No Tricks, just Treats:  Halloween Fiction

The Night Circus By Morgenstern, Erin 2011-09 - Doubleday Books 9780385534635 Check Our Catalog To enter the black-and-white-striped tents of Le Cirque des Reves is to enter a world where objects really do turn into birds and people really do disappear. Even though visitors believe the performances are all illusion, they are obsessively drawn to this extraordinary night circus. Those who run and perform in the circus are its lifeblood. Marco Alisdair runs the operation from London as assistant to the eccentric proprietor. Celia Bowen holds it all together from her role as illusionist. As magicians, Marco and Celia are bound to each other in a deadly competition of powers, creating ever more fantastical venues for circus goers to marvel at. But falling in love was never part of the game, and the players struggle to extricate themselves from this contest while keeping the circus afloat. …More

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children By Riggs, Ransom 2011-06 - Quirk Books 9781594744761 Check Our Catalog A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. A strange collection of very curious photographs. It all waits to be discovered in "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children," an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience. …More

Before I Go to Sleep By Watson, S. J. 2011-06 - Harper 9780062060556 Check Our Catalog In this gripping psychological thriller in the vein of "Shutter Island" and the film "Memento," an amnesiac attempts to reconstruct her past by keeping a journal and discovers the dangerous inconsistencies in the stories of her husband and her secret doctor. HPL patron:  Keeps you on the edge of the couch...a thriller with unexpected twists. …More

Graveminder By Marr, Melissa 2011-05 - William Morrow & Company 9780061826870 Check Our Catalog From the "New York Times"-bestselling author of the Wicked Lovely YA series comes a captivating story about a curse that allows the dead to walk--and the living who are charged with keeping them at rest. …More

Zone One By Whitehead, Colson 2011-10 - Doubleday Books 9780385528078 Check Our Catalog …More

The Last Werewolf By Duncan, Glen 2011-07 - Knopf Publishing Group 9780307595089 Check Our Catalog Meet Jake. A bit on the elderly side (he turns 201 in March), but otherwise in the pink of health. The nonstop sex and exercise he's still getting probably contribute to that, as does his diet: unusual amounts of flesh and blood (at least some from friends and relatives). Jake, of course, is a werewolf, and with the death of his colleague he has now become the only one of his kind. This depresses Jake to the point that he's been contemplating suicide. Yet there are powerful forces who for very different reasons want--and have the power--to keep Jake alive. Here is a powerful new version of the werewolf legend--mesmerizing and undeniably sexy, and with moments of violence so elegantly wrought they dazzle rather than repel. But perhaps its most remarkable achievement is to make the reader feel sympathy for a man who can only be described as a monster--and in doing so, remind us what it means to be human. One of the most original, audacious, and terrifying novels in years. …More