Helix, Season 2, Episode 10: Mother

Time for many many bodies being burned and with appropriate music. Oh Helix I’m disappointed, I expect better/worse from you. While they burn the bodies, Julia tries to convince Amy to hand over “mother” the apple tree that causes infertility. Amy’s price is to be made immortal – Julia agrees

Except, as she reveals to Sergio, it’s impossible. They’ve never been able to replicate the immortality transfer that worked on her and Sarah (for reasons). Instead they search, Peter in particular becoming pretty frantic looking for mother because his big shiny reward from Julia depends on it. Julia even drops in to drop a load of contempt on him as well. As he sulks off, Anne drops in for another revelation – Amy doesn’t have Mother. Only 3 people knew where Mother was: Michael, Anne and her son, Landry and it was he who probably hid it

Who is currently not looking good at all after what Sarah injected into him. Amy can’t get him to talk or even wake up so has an epic temper tantrum with Sarah demanding miracles or else, despite the obvious impossibility of it. Landry does spring to life again, though – when Sarah is alone and kidnappable.

Everyone has to kidnap Sarah at least once, it’s a rule. She’s saved by Anne and Julia’s appearance – Anne chases Landry who manages to lose him. Landry heads to where he hid the root while Amy decides to run around breaking stuff for funsies. She picks up a stalker in Sergio and she tries to flirt with him and he responds with strangling. Amy flirts more and slashes him, get a blade to the throat and then laps up Sergio’s blood. She’s definitely trying to hit all the bases of instability

They finally find Landry at the top of the belltower – the result of which is both Landry and Sergio falling off it.

Alas, we also have to deal with Peter angst because he’s all sadpanda because Julia said mean things to him. Anne, who really needs to get over this fawning after controlling men, tries to assure him what a wonderful person he is. She’s such a liar.

Anne decides things haven’t been nearly creepy enough so takes Peter to a dark room with big stocks of teeth that he connects to the gazillion toothless skulls out in the woods. Anne says something cryptic about the vessel being prepared and turns out the light

Being plunged into darkness in a room with someone talking about a “vessel” is never a good thing. Honestly the teeth and obvious murders are just kind of bonus extras after that. In fact, being in a crowded place in full sunshine with a person talking about a vessel is never a good thing. The minute a vessel is mentioned bad things are sure to follow.

Vampire Diaries, Season 6, Episode 17, A Bird in a Gilded Cage

Caroline is cleaning, much to Enzo’s bemusement because she switched her humanity off – but Caroline again shows us that even with her humanity off she’s still more sensible than the rest of the cast combined. And she’s still joining the school musical (she’s a drama major. Yes it says a lot that she’s been in college for this long and this is the first time we’ve heard about her major).

Oh she also tells Enzo about her master plan last episode which seems to rather worry Enzo. Though whether that’s because he’s afraid of her evil awesomeness or that his own petty revenge plans would be scuppered with a humanity-less Stefan and a dead Sarah I don’t know

Sarah is in hospital with her mind all compelled and Jo feeding her some lies. She’s not very happy about this and lets her new fiancé Alaric know. They’re keeping her in hospital so she doesn’t die with vampire blood in her system – which says a lot about how dangerous they think the area is. Jo’s also running through baby names in full on mummy mode. This seems all kinds of pointless but it does allow Jo to say “anyone named Alaric should not be allowed to name another human.”

Domesticity is ruined by Enzo shaming Alaric into helping capture Caroline. This means lots of Alaric and Enzo snarking at each other and pretending to be relevant.

Damon tries to vervain Stefan so they can re-humanity him but gets his wrist broken in the process. Stefan’s out and about with a lot of weapons so this is likely to get messy. Damon decides to break things to deal with this; he explains his frustration to Elena that the more people Stefan kills while a Ripper, the more guilt and whining Damon has to deal with when Stefan is human again. I almost like how Vampire Diaries isn’t even trying to pretend with its morality any more.

Damon also tells Elena about his dangerous evil mother. Elena, being Elena, decides this is the best way to get Stefan back – unleash a THIRD murderous evil vampire on the town. Damon objects but then decides to go ahead despite already saying what a terribad idea this is. But they’re going to need witch help for it

Which means Bonnie, who has barely been back 5 minutes and has already been treated appallingly by her so-called friends, is now being pressed into service. Bonnie is not amused because not only is Damon asking her help, he’s asking her to work with Kai

Bonnie, just murder the whole town. All of them.

Of course she agrees and they go see Kai who makes this even worse and demands that Bonnie goes with him to the prison world because this show just wants to make Bonnie suffer. At least she keeps telling everyone how terrible they are

Elena also decides to join (because they want to make Bonnie suffer, remember and she always has to be involved).

Divine Misfortune by A. Lee Martinez

Divine Misfortune is set in an alternate world where Gods make deals with humans;  in exchange for tribute, Gods provide humans the benefits of their area of specialty.  Phil and Terri live an average middle class existence but never really manage to move up the corporate ladder because unlike their coworkers, neither Phil or Terri have welcomed a God into their life.  When Phil is passed up for promotion yet again and his neighbour's lawn suddenly becomes perfect with the help of Demeter, Phil decides that it's time for him and Terri to pick a God.  With the multiple of Gods in human history -- this is not an easy task -- particularly when you have to pass a credit check to even look at Zeus's profile and Tyr demands the removal of a hand as proof of devotion.  After looking through the Gods on pantheon.com, Phil and Terri settle on Luka, the God of prosperity and good fortune.  Unlike the other Gods, Luka doesn't seem overly demanding and a safe bet to the risk adverse Terri and Phil but what they forgot, is that dealing with the divine is never as simple as it first seems.

Before they know it, Terri and Phil find themselves in the middle of a holy war between their personal deity Luka and Gorgoz "the ultimate embodiment of the chaos that birth the universe." And what are the two Gods fighting over? Well, a goddess of course.  There's nothing like a love triangle to keep immortality interesting.  If that isn't enough, Luka, who loves his Hawaiian shirts, decides to summarily move in and bring his friend Quetzalcoatl along for the ride. Getting though a typical day is hard enough but when you're dealing with God engaged in a holy war, a South American God filled with guilt for not dealing with the conquistadors, and a Goddess of love, now turned into the   Goddess of tragedy because centuries later, she's still not over being dumped, life can become complicated quickly.

You can probably tell from the description that there is a lot going on in Divine Misfortune, yet despite the twists and turns and the appearance of various Gods from assorted pantheons, the story never once feels confused.  Divine Misfortune is also infused with Martinez's great sense of humor and this makes the book at times laugh out loud funny.  After all, who wouldn't want to offer tribute to a God for some luck when informed that the in laws are coming for a visit, along with their multitude of children, particularly when one of the kids is going through a pyromaniac stage? With incidents like having an entire city's water supply being turned into grape soda as the result of an epic God showdown, all the world's pregnant dogs giving birth at once to winged puppies, Zeus and Mog giving out signed autographed photos and the Goddess of revenge giving boils to spurned lovers, Divine Misfortune is written to make you giggle, then laugh out loud until you have tears rolling down your face.  

In terms of gender, Divine Misfortune had three very strong characters female characters but Terri was by far my favourite, Terri, was so feminist, she refused to be saved by a man.  When Phil, Terri and  Bonnie, (who is forced to deal with the result of unwittingly becoming Syph, the goddess of tragedy number one sycophant), are confronted by gun men, who want to kill them as a tribute to Gorgoz, Phil decides to offer his life in trade for the two women.  Terri however is not at all impressed.

Phil stood and stepped between Eugene and his wife. “Kill me. But don’t shoot the women.”

“That’s some misogynistic bullshit.” Teri pushed him aside. “Kill me but let them go.”

“This isn’t a good time for feminism,” he replied.

“Says you.” She turned her eyes away from the guns trained on them. “You know how I feel about women and children first. It puts women in the same category as children. And I am not a child.”

“I wasn’t saying that. I was just trying to be noble.”

“Because it’s the man’s job to be noble,” she said, “and the woman’s job to—”

“Dammit, this is not the time to be having this discussion!”

Bonnie stood. “Shoot me. I’m the one who is going to die anyway. Might as well get it out of the way.”

“Excuse me,” said Eugene. “But this is an assassination, not a negotiation. You’re all going to get shot. There’s no way around that.”     

“Although, for the record, miss,” said Rick, “I agree with you that it’s chauvinistic nonsense." (pg117) 

When Phil later decides to trade himself Gorgoz to keep Terri safe, does not at all see the gesture as loving and supportive.

Supernatural, Season 10, Episode 15: The Things They Carried

Ok that was a very random series of flashbacks.

And now we have a kidnapped woman hanging from her feet with some dripping water because we’re really pushing the horror movie vibe. A man cuts her throat and gathers the blood in a bucket

Now can we calm down the camera angles please? The obligatory deaths is over

To the Winchester cave where Sam I still illicitly researching ways to cure the Mark of Cain despite Dean telling him to stop. Dean assumes he’s looking at porn (his only comment on that is “not where we eat”). Dean has a case – that woman was eaten and had her bone marrow drained and she was an excellent martial artist. Dean calls case, Sam tries to distract him (still all Cain worried) but fails. Sam keeps unsubtly studying even while they’re travelling and Dean, again, calls him on trying to fix the unfixable. Dean wants to move on and do what they can until he can’t do it anymore – and he’d kind of like Sam to keep going with him, not be lost in research

Time to imitate federal agents as they do on a regular basis and get away with it because absolutely no-one ever checks (they don’t even bother with the fake badges this time, the suits are enough. I have this idea that somewhere in America there are several confused lawyers, accountants and undertakers being drafted into police investigations because local law enforcement has assumed they’re FBI). The local police think they’ve found who did it – a guy who conveniently suicided soon afterwards; one of several suicides which the sheriff puts down to it being a military town. Also no bite marks on the body so probably not cannibalism

Still not convinced it’s not supernatural given the gruesome nature of the suicide, Sam and Dean interview the widow of Rick, the suspected murderer. She knows he was deployed, but not where, and that he had a raging thirst

They also learn that another soldier, Kit, is showing similar symptoms. To make things more complicated because Cole is back, yes the guy who wanted to kill Dean but then was beaten up then talked out of it and generally hasn’t been that effective. He wants to team up with the Winchesters to make sure they help his friend Kit rather than just yell “monster” and stab him a few times

Speaking of, Kit kills a shop assistant over bottled water then drinks the blood.

The gang gets news about this just as Cole’s contacts reveal Rick and Kit were in Iraq in a cemetery with an odd, raging POW on their last deployment.

Cole does have a lead on where Kit is but, fearing Winchester wrath, he decides to go alone. He nearly gets himself killed before the Winchesters save him – yes they followed him, they’re not that big a fool, and the raging Kit spits out a nasty wormy thing that the Winchesters kill; but not before something goes down Cole’s throat

Urban Fantasy Awards 2015 - polls closing!

Today is your last chance to get in your votes for the Urban Fantasy Awards

It hasn't been the smoothest journey for our first awards, technical issues, illness and possible invasions of undead marmots have caused more delay and disruption than we'd like and certainly dragged it out for longer than expected. Still lessons learned for next year!

Get your votes in now - who deserves the blessing of a Golden Fang or the shame of a Dread Fanpoodle

VOTE for Golden Fangs here

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Blue Rhapsody (Require Cookie Short) by Grace McDermott

Michael Hu Luk, or Raz as he prefers to be called, is struggling to live day by day with his mental illness, the little support he gets from hat and the long suffering tolerance of his dutiful older sister

Until a chance encounter brings him to the attention of Agent Ryan from the Agency, the enforcers and facilitators of the supernatural world. And Agent Ryan can see the potential in Michael

The diversity of this book is excellent and really emphasises what the Agency is about. They don’t tolerate diversity. They don’t tolerate minorities – they celebrate them, embrace them, are empowered and enabled by the different elements they bring to the organisation and are stronger because of it.

This is especially true with mental illness as we take Michael (or Raz as he prefers to be called) who is considered completely and utterly unemployable because of his mental illness. His sister regards him as a burden, he himself has fully absorbed the idea that he’s completely useless. But he thrives at the Agency. He’s useful and capable at the Agency. And it’s not because he develops super powers, nor is it because he is magically cured by his mental illness – but he is given a place, a work environment and colleagues who are willing to make the necessary accommodations for him to succeed.

It’s wonderful – and also excellently added to by his sister’s contempt of him. Because she does support him; she is constantly giving him financial support. But it’s clear she doesn’t respect him; it shows that you can actually HELP a marginalised person while hurting them and regarding them with contempt.

We also see racial and LGBTQ diversity. Michael is Asian and gay both of which inform his character, both his family history and, again, with how his sister relates to him (apparently supportive but, again, not wanting his “not normal” gayness being discussed. And her patented “I’m totally not a bigot but I’m disgusted” expression) we have characters who are bisexual and genderqueer, South Asian characters, Black characters – even with the relatively large cast this short story has an amazingly diverse array of characters and some excellent messages about marginalised people in life and the work place.

iZombie, Season 1, Episode 1: Pilot

Introducing Olivia (Liv) awesome medical resident who just saves someone’s life and earns the snarky respect of fellow resident, Marcy and her really enthusiastic fiancé. The perfect night ends with a party on a boat

A boat that then burns while being attacked by zombies. Personally, I blame the fiancé, he said “what’s the worst that can happen?” He’s lucky Nazis with lasers riding velociraptors didn’t attack.

Liv wakes up in a body bag with a sudden hunger for brains. And the surprise of the EMT

Move forward 5 months and a much much paler Liv buys a whole lot of bronzer and Night of the Living Dead. And her mother, her little brother, her room mate, her now ex-fiance and others are staging an intervention over the whole dumping her fiancé, quitting her job and working in a morgue turn her life has taken. They think she has PTSD after the party gone wrong and she needs help

Liv opts for no. Though she admits she has change, and not just because she’s a zombie – she is also very very jaded.

To work, her chatty colleague (possibly boss) Dr. Ravi and a dead Jane Doe; he gives her a quick run down before being called out. We have a monologue about how she’s lost all her ambition drive and planning and is now hungry – as she prepares and eats some brains.  It manages not to be quite as disgusting as it sounds. But only because it sounds so very very disgusting. Except she’s not nearly as alone as she thinks – Ravi has been watching her and knows she’s a zombie

Thankfully he’s more curious than anything

He was the medical examiner for the party massacre she survived and after discovering she had removed a brain he started checking up on other autopsies she finished finding lots of missing brains. He’s rather hilariously amused, eager and generally excited about the zombie to examine while poor Liv tries to grasp his complete lack of fear, revulsion or even shock.

She recites her experience and adds why she needs brains – she tries to keep it to minimum but if she doesn’t eat brains she becomes less intelligent and more mean suggesting that a hungry Liv may be a zombie-apocalypse Liv. Also she likes hot sauce because her sense of taste is fried.

Curiosity is interrupted by police detective Clive who wants an ID on Jane Doe – Ravi has nothing but when Clive shows some handcuffs (non standard issue) found by the body, Liv has a memory flash of the victim’s and announces that the victim was arrested for shop lifting in Canada in 2008. Something Ravi confirms. Of course Clive would like an explanation for this – so Ravi goes with her being psychic which Clive, naturally, doesn’t believe

Cover Review: 9th March - 13th March

Fury's Kiss (Dorina Basarab #3) by Karen Chance

Let it be known that no matter what threats lurk out there, no matter how mysterious the fae, how cunning the vampire or powerful the mage, Dorina is ready to stand up and face it. Well face away from it, anyway.

Yes, arses ahoy - there’s nothing like a lethal action heroine deciding her best side is her rump - accentuated, of course, with sexy leather. No no it’s armour, honest (ignore the gap).

The Baskerville Tales (Short Stories): The Adventure of the Wollaston Ritual, The Strange and Alarming Courtship of Miss Imogen Roth, The Steamspinner Mutiny: Emma Jane Holloway

I like this. It’s understated, suggestive, pretty without being overtly sexual with clothes that excellently show off the era without the need to drown us in lashings of victoriana at every turn. I also quite like her withdrawn, hidden facial expression, is that a hidden smile? A demure look down? A secret being held? I like it

The only issue is that it’s very very vague as to what the book is about beyond “historical”