Cara’s mother has disappeared. Her father isn’t talking about it. Her big brother Max is hiding behind his iPod, and her genius little brother Jackson is busy studying the creatures he collects from the beach. But when a watery specter begins to haunt the family’s Cape Cod home, Cara and her brothers realize that their scientist mother may not be who they thought she was—and that the world has much stranger, much older inhabitants than they had imagined. With help from Cara’s best friend Hayley, the three embark on a quest that will lead them from the Cape’s hidden, ancient places to a shipwreck at the bottom of the sea. They’re soon on the front lines of an ancient battle between good and evil, with the terrifying “pouring man” close on their heels. One chapter will be posted Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays until all 10 chapters are up. These will be followed by the second book in the series, The Shimmers in the Night. A Junior Library Guild Pick; Kirkus Reviews Best of 2011; Selected for the ABC Best Books for Children Catalog; Locus Notable Books.

Fantasy novel | gay romance sub-plot| poc main character. An heir to a monarchy threatened by a popular revolution forges an alliance with an amnesiac man who could have forgotten links to the rebellion. - - - Heron, Monarch-in-Prospect of Ceres, lost his mother to an icy storm. Two years later he still battles with the grief. The storm is back. And Heron finds a man trapped unconscious in the middle of the cold winds. His vital signs are odd and the only thing he remembers is his name : Davir. Heron provides Davir with medical care and finds in the stranger the opportunity to have a pawn in the royal guard. An alibi to buy himself liberty from the control of the ruling council of the capital. An indebted man is a man easy to persuade, and Davir acts as intended. As a popular rebellion against the Monarchy festers in the capital, Heron's new-found liberty soon leads him to cross paths with the rebels. An unsettling discovery comes to the surface: he'd been lied to about the death of his mother by the ruling council. Suspicious that he's, too, a pawn trapped in a tangle of political interests he cares little for, Heron is determined to get to the bottom of the secrets kept from him. Davir's military abilities could be of great help. Davir, too, needs Heron's ressources to discover his forgotten identity. An alliance between the two is then formed. But the clues leading to Davir's past point toward where they shouldn't : the rebellion and dark, sinful, supernatural arts of soul eaters. ____________________________________ ©Copyright A. Gonçalo. All rights reserved.