Iron Skin (Iron Skin, #1)
by Tina Connely
Genre: paranormal historical romance, steampunk
Release date: October 2, 2012 by Tor

Description:

Jane Eliot wears an iron mask.

It’s the only way to contain the fey curse that scars her cheek. The Great War is five years gone, but its scattered victims remain—the ironskin.

When a carefully worded listing appears for a governess to assist with a “delicate situation”—a child born during the Great War—Jane is certain the child is fey-cursed, and that she can help.

Teaching the unruly Dorie to suppress her curse is hard enough; she certainly didn’t expect to fall for the girl’s father, the enigmatic artist Edward Rochart. But her blossoming crush is stifled by her own scars, and by his parade of women. Ugly women, who enter his closed studio…and come out as beautiful as the fey.

Jane knows Rochart cannot love her, just as she knows that she must wear iron for the rest of her life. But what if neither of these things is true? Step by step Jane unlocks the secrets of her new life—and discovers just how far she will go to become whole again.

Read an excerpt of Ironskin

. . .

Beauty and the Bounty Hunter (Once Upon a Time in the West, #1) by Lori Austin
Breathe (Breathe, #1) by Sarah Crossan
Courting Trouble (Bustlepunk Chronicles #2) by Jenny Schwartz

Dark Currents (Agent of Hel #1) by Jacqueline Carey
Dark Storm (Dark, #23) Christine Feehan
Daughter of the Sword (Fated Blades, #1) by Steve Bein

Death and the Girl Next Door (Darklight, #1) by Darynda Jones (YA)
Death’s Rival (Jane Yellowrock, #5) by Faith Hunter
Ember’s Kiss (Dragonfire, #8) by Deborah Cooke

Eve and Adam by Katherine Applegate, Michael Grant (YA)
Feedback (Variant, #2) by Robison Wells (YA)
Fury’s Kiss (Dorina Basarab, #3) by Karen Chance

Laid Open (Brown Siblings, #4.5) Lauren Dane
London Eye (Toxic City, #1) by Tim Lebbon
Mate Claimed (Shifters Unbound, #4) by Jennifer Ashley

Mortal Ties (World of the Lupi, #9) by Eileen Wilks
Phantom Shadows (Immortal Guardians #3) by Dianne Duvall
Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow (YA)

Poison Princess (The Arcana Chronicles, #1) by Kresley Cole (YA)
Revelation (The Seven Signs, #1) by Erica Hayes
Savage Hunger (Heart of the Jaguar, #1) by Terry Spear

Son (The Giver, #4) by Lois Lowry (MG)
Songs of Love and Darkness by Various Authors (anthology)
The Mark of Athena (Heroes of Olympus, #3) by Rick Riordan (MG)

The Trouble with Highlanders (Highlander, #5) by Mary Wine
Three Card Monte (The Martian Alliance #2) by Gini Koch
Through To You by Emily Hainsworth (YA)

Werewolf In Denver (Wild About You, #4) by Vicki Lewis Thompson
Whispers at Moonrise (Shadow Falls, #4) by C.C. Hunter
Wicked Whispers (Castle of Dark Dreams, #6) by Nina Bangs

. . .

This week is what I’d like to think of as a sleeper hit week. You won’t find a barrage of huge, ubiquitous genre fiction releases bound for immediate success. What you will find is a really solid collection of reads that will suit an array of tastes.

A fan of twisted retellings of classic literature? The book Ironskin has been described as Jane Eyre steampunk-flavored redux, with fae…and an iron mask. You might develop an acute case of cover lust (I know I did!); some brief comments on the book by ever-loved Anne Aguirre says promising things about the title, too.

I usually don’t make much of a fuss (pos or neg) about the ethnicity of book protagonists, but I must say that I was pretty excited to hear about the protagonist of Daughter of the Sword. It’s not just that she’s of Asian descent (that’s not a first); it’s that she’s a female Japanese detective in Tokyo, Japan. Not descriptions you often find all in one place, right? I love that the story isn’t Western-based, that it uses the mythos of that region to form its urban fantasy elements. Here’s to hoping the story is as solid and promising as its premise.

If you are one of the millions of children (or adults) that read the Lois Lowry book The Giver, then you’ll perhaps be excited to know that the last book in the quartet of the same name is out this week. That’s right, twenty years later and there’s finally a conclusion to one of the most beloved stories in modern literature. Cray cray, when you think of how much of a stretch that is for just four books–well, when you think of the rate of output of some other authors. Time will tell (more of it, that is) if the fourth installment is deserving of being grouped with the first.

Old series, new series, reduxes, fresh concepts, historical settings, futuristic settings, romance, horror, realism, fantasy, institution authors, debut novels, aytpical heroines, traditional heroes, light humor, dark drama…..I could go on. Gird your wallets, ladies and gents. ^_^ Bookstore’s calling your name.

. . .

So have you been tempted into a visit to the bookstore? ^_^ Do you often hear about/read urban fantasy books set in modern-day Asia/Africa/South America? Does such a notion draw you in particular?

About Alisha

Alisha, the bespectacled and ever nerdy California girl, simply won't leave home without a book in hand. She loves language learnin' and is working toward becoming a bonafide grammar ninja. On any given day you'll find her haunting local libraries or baking scores of cupcakes and sweet treats.

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