Wednesday, April 26, 2017

Six books that will rearrange your childhood memories

At the B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog Jeff Somers tagged "six books turn comforting, innocent entertainments into something subversive and disturbing," including:
Meddling Kids, by Edgar Cantero

Most of us have fond memories of the gang from Scooby Doo, the original meddling kids, forever foiling the overly complex schemes of criminals in abandoned amusement parks everywhere. In his forthcoming novel, Cantero isn’t writing literally about Shaggy and Scooby and the rest, but the Blyton Summer Detective Club is clearly modeled on the Scooby gang. In 1990, thirteen years after disbanding in the wake of the case of the Sleepy Lake monster, things are looking grim for the former teen detectives. Some are dead, some are wanted criminals, others are missing. The survivors become convinced their misery is connected to that final case, and they return to Sleepy Lake to face it—and bring unimaginable, Lovecraftian horrors floating to the surface. If you loved those old cartoons more than Scooby Snacks, this book will make you wonder what in the world Shaggy could possibly do to support himself in the real world, and you’ll flinch every time they rip a Halloween mask off of some criminal mastermind.
Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue