Return to Exile

I am waiting for permission to post the video of an improv story from the Storytelling Workshop.  Did you KNOW that I ran a storytelling workshop?  Yes!  I did!  And once I post that video I will stop running on and on and on about it.  (It was fun and amazing and the kids were sooo clever and......)

 In the meantime, let me tell you about a new book,  Return to Exile by E. J. Patten.  It's the first in The Hunter Chronicles.  It gave me nightmares before I was even halfway through it.

I must admit, I am easily creeped-out.  That said, the town of Exile is a pretty awful place.

Mild Spoilers may follow.   If you really don't want to know anything about this book, skip to the last two paragraphs.  There is just enough info there to help you decide if the book is for you.

The Prologue does two things.  It shows the reader that Patten's writing style will include clever word play and that does lessen the tension a teensy bit.  It also sets the main character up as a boy who is marked from birth as something special and possibly something frightening.

Sky's family moves again on his 12th birthday but before they do he has another "hunting" lesson with his Uncle Phineas.  Phineas has been training Sky as a hunter, and in the history and folklore of Exile, as long as Sky can remember.  This move is momentous because the family is returning to the town of Exile, where Phineas' mansion stands.  And it is momentous because it is the first birthday in Sky's memory that Uncle Phineas does NOT show up to eat Sky's mother's world famous, though not necessarily tasty, goulash.  He gave Sky his watch earlier that day so we, the readers, are not all that surprised when Phineas is a no-show.

In Exile, the adults are clueless and children are disappearing.  Sky meets a group of teens that go out at night "hunting" in an unschooled attempt to keep their families safe.  Sky fears that his Uncle Phineas has been killed and he and his new "friends" join together to fight the horrors that surround the town of Exile.

The book comes out on September 6th.  And if you like creepy towns where the adults act like mindless automatons and kids are on their own against evil creatures, this book is for you.  Patten's writing style is flippant and clever and might keep us more "sensitive" types reading, as well.  Keep a light on.