Author Kat Kruger: Book Tour (Toronto)

Young adult author

Kat Kruger 

whose supernatural series, The Magdeburg Trilogy, 

I've completely reviewed and recommended, 

is hitting the road (well, at least into the Toronto area) 

to promote the series' final volume, The Night is Found.  

You've got five wonderful opportunities 

to meet and learn from the popular author of

  The Night has Teeth, The Night has Claws and The Night is Found, 

all from Fierce Ink Press.

Kat Kruger will be at the following locations and times:

ChiSeries Reading
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
8-10 p.m.
The Round Venue
152 Augusta Avenue (Kensington Market area)

The Night is Found book signing
Thursday, September 18, 2014
12-4 p.m.
Indigo at Bay and Bloor


Q & A with Kat Kruger
Thursday, September 18, 2014
7-8 p.m.
Toronto Public Library, Spadina Branch
10 Spadina Road

Writing Workshop with Angela Misri, author of Jewel of the Thames
Friday, September 19, 2014  
1-3 p.m.
Riverdale Library
370 Broadview Avenue

Word on the Street (Toronto): Reading and book signing
Sunday, September 21, 2014
11:45 a.m.
Queen's Park Circle

Word on the Street (Toronto): Wattpad Meet and Greet 
Sunday, September 21, 2014 
3 p.m.
Queen's Park Circle

Say hello from me!

The Night is Found: Guest Post by author Kat Kruger

With the recent release of The Night is Found (Fierce Ink Press, 2014), reviewed here yesterday, author Kat Kruger has kindly agreed to share her perspective on writing her final book in The Madgeburg Trilogy.

                 Welcome                    

              * Kat Kruger *              

I don’t think there are words or even an emoji to describe what it’s like to write the last book in a trilogy besides to say that it’s been a bittersweet roller coaster of emotions. The characters of The Magdeburg Trilogy have been with me for several years now, from the black she-wolf standing over an unmarked grave to the mad scientist who sent me down research rabbit holes. The Night Is Found represents the end of their collective journey (although I have in mind to eventually write some graphic novel prequels).

I’ll certainly miss the world and the vast amount of research that it took to build it. In that sense I don’t think I can ever wholly let go of the world. I’m glad I’ve got those prequels to look forward to at some point in the future! Right now I’m feeling some intense post-trilogy blues. When I began writing the series it never dawned on me just how attached I’d get to these fictional people. Sure I cried a little when I finished The Night Has Teeth. I wept even more at the final scene of The Night Has Claws because it was even more devastating to me than the previous book. At that time I should have realized Book the Third was going to hit me hard but by then I was at a point of no return.

So, writing the final book in the trilogy was emotionally taxing to say the least. Closure sucks. Every time one person’s story “ended” I had to take a breather. Overall I think the happy moments outweigh the tragic ones. All the major loose ends are tied up but I’ve also left it open for the reader to imagine life after The Magdeburg Trilogy for Connor and his friends. To me it’s a book about hope and possibilities so to tie everything up too neatly would have felt like a cheat.

It was also a hard book to write in terms of expectations (not just my own). I actually had a few false starts with the final book. “Where to start?” was the question I kept asking myself. It wasn’t until I was on a road trip to New England for my birthday last year that I understood I had to cut the 5,000 words I had already written. That early draft picked up the story in the moments directly following the end of the second book. It wasn’t even fifteen minutes of driving on this trip, though, when a coyote crossed ahead of me on the highway. I know a good sign when I see one. So I introduced the “Wilds” of the North American packs who figure prominently in the first part of The Night Is Found.

Since the first book had a prologue, I felt that the last one needed an epilogue to bookend everything. That final scene is an image that I’ve carried with me since well before I even started writing The Night Is Found. As it developed in my thoughts, it became more and more of a love letter to fans of Arden. It caught me off guard just how many readers connected with him and I hope the epilogue serves as a thank you to everyone who saw beyond his roughness to embrace the fiercely loyal man that he truly is.

Of all the books that I’ve written, this is the one where I left my heart on the page. I will miss each and every one of the wolves of Magdeburg long after the last reader has closed the final page on the series.

   *    *    *   

Here's an early notice about an author event featuring Kat Kruger.

On Thursday, September 18, 2014

at 7 p.m.

author Kat Kruger

will give a talk at

the Toronto Public Library 

(Spadina branch)

Toronto, ON

See the TPL website for details here.

See more about Kat Kruger's writing at http://katkruger.com/ or at her publisher Fierce Ink Press website.

The Night is Found: Blog Tour begins

Let the Blog Tour begin!

by Kat Kruger

Fierce Ink Press

978-1-927746-57-8
978-1-927746-59-2 (epub)
978-1-927746-60-8 (Kindle)

301 pp.

Ages 14+

For release July 22, 2014

Reviewed from eARC

Being lost can be so much more than not knowing your location.  It can be the confusion that comes with new knowledge or revelations, and Connor Lewis' learning that he is a werewolf would be reason enough to feel lost and out of touch. For a kid, almost eighteen, going from geeky gamer to werewolf and now to pack leader and target of the Luparii (werewolf hunters), Connor needs a lot of finding to happen.

When Rodolfus de Aquila a.k.a. Roul, pack leader and owner of Fenrir Pharmaceuticals, chose to take a bullet meant for Connor, he gave the young man the task of bringing together the packs of Europe.  With the Luparii in possession of Wolf's Bane, a bio-weapon cure against lycanthropy produced by Henri Boguet, and with the Hounds of God led by magistrate Breber aiming to kill off werewolves, Connor needs to determine how best to organize the packs quickly. To that end, Connor and Amara travel to New York City to learn from the werewolves who'd left the Old World in the 1600's to avoid persecution and were rumoured to have become unified.  Meanwhile, Arden is tasked with visiting other packs and warning them of the Luparii and inviting them to Paris to witness their damaging effects.

Connor and Amara are received by a NYPD captain, Marrock, and the bored rich girl Esrin, who represent the Founders, short for the Wolf Conservation Foundation.  They manage their own pack as well as seven territories (wildlife sanctuaries) of the Wilds, werewolves who are ignorant of the outside world.  When the Luparii make their presence known using a device made by Phenix Industries, the arms technology business that funds the Founders, Connor recognizes that,

"I have a sense that what we bury here today is any hope of understanding of how to make things right overseas." (pg. 168)

Things overseas aren't necessarily faring any better.  Madison, Connor's love interest, has been under wraps at Fenrir Pharmaceuticals in Frankfurt since he accidentally bit her and changed her into a full-fledged werewolf.  Trajan, the biochemist, has been using her as a test subject for an antivenin for Wolf's Bane but Madison wants to play a part in helping Connor. Unfortunately, because of her relationship to Connor, Madison has become a commodity that has the Luparii, the Hounds of God and even ex-boyfriend Josh trying to get to her.

The complexity of The Night is Found is wild. Based on critical information from the first and second books in the series, The Night Has Teeth (Fierce Ink Press, 2012) and The Night Has Claws (Fierce Ink Press, 2013) respectively, The Night is Found twists the key characters of Connor, Madison, Arden and Amara into new personas as they accept their new attributes (bitten, cured, healed, safe, human, wolf, werewolf–whatever) and try to make things right while working with and against others.  Kat Kruger's characters are so real that I'd consider looking up some of the companies and locations mentioned in the book to see if they truly exist.  Yeah, I know werewolves aren't real (I do have to keep reminding myself of that) but Kat Kruger has developed all her characters so fully that it's sometimes hard to believe they're not.

If I hadn't enjoyed the first two books, keeping the storylines straight would've been difficult.  But I did, and I could, and appreciated Kat Kruger's complex storytelling all the more.  She's able to juggle the multiple subplots of teen angst and romance as well as biotechnology and belief systems easily with the paranormal and create a riveting tale that's imbued with sarcasm, sweetness and savagery. And still Kat Kruger convincingly allows Connor, Arden, Amara and Madison to un-lose themselves and amicably position themselves in their paranormal reality now that The Night is Found.

 ≈ ≈ ≈ ≈ ≈ ≈ ≈ 

Here's your CHANCE TO WIN a free digital copy of the entire Magdeburg Trilogy:

Just leave an appropriate comment below about why you'd like to read the whole Magdeburg Trilogy, and I'll choose a winner for Wednesday.

Easy peasy.

The Night is Found: Blog Tour begins tomorrow

Starting tomorrow

right here on CanLit for LittleCanadians

Fierce Ink Press

presents

Take a Walk on the Wilds Side 

blog tour

for 

the final instalment in

The Magdeburg Trilogy

by Kat Kruger

 The Night is Found 

Here's what we'll have:

• a giveaway of digital copies of ALL three books in The Magdeburg Trilogy (and all you have to do is add a comment to the blog post);
• my review of The Night is Found; and 
• a special blog post by author Kat Kruger about finishing her trilogy.

Please check in tomorrow and the next day for the blog tour's stop here at CanLit for LittleCanadians.

† † † † † † † † †

Many thanks to Fierce Ink Press for the opportunity to share in this wonderful event

The Night Has Claws (The Magdeburg Trilogy, Book Two)

by Kat Kruger
Fierce Ink Press
978-0-9917937-5-4 (pb)
978-1-927746-02-8 (ebook)
269 pp.
Ages 14+
Release September 24, 2013
Reviewed from advance release ebook

When Kat Kruger ended her award-winning first book in The Madgeburg Trilogy, The Night Has Teeth (reviewed here on January 13, 2013), it was bloody mayhem.  Really.  Seventeen-year-old Connor Lewis had learned that he is a pure werewolf whose "nature" was only revealed after born-werewolf Amara had accidentally bitten him.  His special nature had drawn the attention of Henri Boguet, one of the bitten "monsters", whose biotech company has developed an antivenin for werewolf bites as well as a cure he calls Wolf Bane.  And Connor's school friends, Madison and Josh, had revealed that Josh had bitten Madison, condemning her to a life as a monster too. Even though Josh is still in love with Madison and desperate to make things up to her, Madison and Connor have an affinity for each other. With the nature of one's werewolfness determining the allegiances one has, Connor is confused understandably about whom to trust.

The Night Has Claws begins with three different story lines which will ultimately converge.  First, with Boguet being captured, he is remanded to custody to stand trial before the High Court of Madgeburg, the werewolf court.  Secondly, Madison who has shot Boadicea, Boguet's associate, believing she was going to harm Connor, focuses on what she has done, what is on the USB stick Boadicea tried to give Connor, and how she feels about Connor and Josh.  Lastly, born-werewolf Arden, Amara's mate, who'd appeared to die by Boguet's hand (teeth, actually), had been buried along with Boadicea by the Hounds of God (a society of the bitten).  But Arden had not died, though he desperately wished he had, becoming human instead, getting Boguet's cure through his venom. 

So we've got Connor sticking close to Arden and helping him survive as a human while learning from Arden how to live as a werewolf.  But through it all, Connor must decide to whom he will ally himself:  Roul (Rodolfus de Aquila), leader of Arden's former pack, or the Hounds of God to which Josh and Madison belong. 

In Quedlinburg, Germany, where the High Court of Madgeburg officiates, all gather for the prosecution of Boguet by Heaven's Hand, the organization that governs werewolves.  In addition to Connor, Roul, Arden, Amara, Madison, and Josh and their related groups, the Luparii (marked by white armbands) who act as an intergovernmental European task force to limit and maintain control of the werewolf populations show a strong presence.  On the surface, the court and Heaven's Hand profess to protect all life with the singular law of condemning to death any who bites a human but, as with many organizations in which individuals carry their own emotional baggage and opinions, hypocrisy creates exceptions and thus friction.  While Boguet may be the official defendant, Connor and Arden become targets for the judge, Breber. While Madison may come to their aid with surprisingly revelations about Boguet, instead of quelling both judicial and physical attacks, her news launches a new barrage hitherto unknown.

Hold onto your book or device because The Night Has Claws may start with the emotional and physical clean-up of story-lines from The Night Has Teeth but it ends on an even messier closing. I don't mean messier as in confused but rather in terms of catastrophic ruin.  It breaks apart with secrets revealed, relationships and alliances exposed and shattered, and upcoming hostilities and combat forecast. The reader may still be hopeful for reconciliation between Connor and Madison and Arden and Amara but surprisingly Kat Kruger has you cheering for the motley band of protagonists and even laughing along at times. (Honestly, how often can a writer use the admonishment "Bite me" as a double entendre?) And there's even more action, surprises and affairs of the heart coming because we know that where The Night Has Claws leaves off, Book Three will launch and continue to thrill.

Not Your Ordinary Wolf Girl

by Emily Pohl-Weary

Razorbill

978-0-67006-640-7

304 pp.

Ages 13+

September, 2013

Forget about any kind of ordinariness for Sam Lee.  At eighteen years old, she's one third of the popular band, The Cream Puffs, and their primary songwriter too. Along with their bad-girl lead singer, Jules, and sexy, bookish drummer Malika, The Cream Puffs are the hip band in New York City.  But Sam's life is not one that fans envision for a rock musician, especially one that performs with so much power on stage.  She eschews the parties and the fans, rides her bike at night, and lives on the top floor of a converted pickle factory that she owns.  And, except for crushing on Harris Walls, who is animating a video for the band and who has a gorgeous girlfriend, Sam is considered the loner tomboy (although there was a large guy who kept staring at her during a concert and tried to talk to her afterwards who obviously didn't think so).

But, after taking a nasty fall while careening through Central Park on her way home from the concert, Sam is jumped by a large dog, and then rescued from it by another dog that takes a gash out of her forearm.  Except for a voracious appetite, unquenchable thirst and a slight fever, Sam experiences no frightening symptoms but she goes to Emerg to get checked out.  But, with evidence of the bite gone and her status as a rock musician known, Sam gets out of there promptly when the medical staff start talking about testing for drugs and a psych assessment. 

Things go from bad to worse, or weird to bizarre, at their photo and video shoot, when Sam cannot eat enough roast beef and turkey sandwiches and gets aggressive with Jules, definitely odd for the introverted vegetarian.  She's sweating through her custom-made shirt, annoying their director and she can detect Harris' scent! Insisting that she is sick, Sam takes off. On her ride, she is followed by Marlon, an art school friend of Harris', who offers her beef jerky and a mega-water bottle and claims that he just wants to make sure she's okay, knowing what she's going through.  Finally, freakish dreams, messages from her nasty neighbours about her big dog (?), attacks by girl-gangs dressed as dogs, and a fan photo of her devouring a whole BBQ chicken help Marlon persuade Sam that she needs his help.

The title may give away what has happened to Sam, but it cannot even allude to the multitude of subplots involving Marlon's brother Owen, mutated werewolves, other supernaturals, and Sam's worries about revealing herself to her friends and the public.  And, of course, the love triangle of Sam, Marlon and Harris.

Emily Pohl-Weary's writing is evocative, ensuring the reader truly understands the depth of Sam's physical and emotional transformation, and her characterizations are explicit and fully revealing, reading like exposés from any teen magazine.  Emily Pohl-Weary (website here) takes Sam from a talented young woman who works in the social realm of music performance but prefers to live in a private world, to a wolf girl who finally finds the freedom to be herself.  While not an easy transformation, particularly if there's some confusion whether it is real or imagined, Sam's metamorphosis takes her through the full gamut of emotional responses: horrified, dazed, hysterical, logical, numb, secretive, embarrassed, angry, and appreciative.  Surprisingly, with people like Marlon and Malika volunteering to support her in her changeover to wolf girl,  Sam's Not Your Ordinary Wolf Girl storyline becomes all the more credible (if you can say that about werewolves) and definitely less horrific.

The Night Has Teeth (The Magdeburg Trilogy Book One)

Written by Kat Kruger
Fierce Ink Press
978-0-988-10671-0
294 pp.
Ages14+
2012


The Night Has Teeth, and it has sharp edges and secrets and anger and judgement.  As the City of Light, Paris harbours enlightenment but sometimes in dark corners and in underlying worlds that extend beyond its catacombs.  Surprisingly, seventeen-year-old American Connor Lewis has chosen to spend his senior year here at the Victor Hugo International School.  Perhaps he might reinvent himself, becoming someone other than the boy who lost control of himself and bit a kid in kindergarten. 

Connor's host family is only one young woman, Amara Liang, a tattoo artist with a large dog named Lou.  Their paths rarely cross until Connor makes the acquaintance of two other students, Josh and Madison, and suddenly Amara and her boyfriend Arden seem to be everywhere.  Although Madison reveals that she and Josh no longer date after an incident at a campground in which Madison was almost killed, Josh is obviously still attracted to the cherry-redheaded girl and jealous of the attention that she gives Connor.  But the three friends continue to spend time together, going for sushi, playing Truth or Dare and clubbing, often encountering Amara and Arden.

After Arden defends them from a wolf attack, and Connor, Amara and Arden return to the apartment, Connor sees Amara in bed with Lou who is bandaged just as Arden had been.  Seems Lou (actually Loup i.e., French for wolf) is Arden in wolf-form and both he and Amara are werewolves, determined to protect Connor from a beautiful young woman, Boadicea Faelen, who is showing an interest in him.  Connor can't comprehend Boadicea's interest in a geeky gamer until Amara explains that they all sense something "different" about Connor related to lycanthropy.  Boadicea wants Connor for her dangerous boss, Henri Boguet, who 400 years ago led the people in attacks against the wolves before being bitten by Arden.  Now Boguet, one of the damned as neither werewolf or human, heads a biotech company intent on eradicating the werewolf genome and saving humanity from their disease and terror.

What follows is a dance of secrets and manipulation as Connor is pulled towards and away from three groups who all have some interest in him:  Madison and Josh; Amara, Arden and pack leader Roul; and Boadicea, Boguet and his men Trajan and Attila.  As he tries to sort through the information, often selective, that each shares with him, never knowing whom to trust, Connor replays the kindergarten biting incident and his reaction to it, wondering about his own nature and link to lycanthropy.

Although The Night Has Teeth has all the elements of other paranormal young adult books, it is unmatched to any I have read to date.  While the protagonists are teens dealing with issues of independence and self-recognition, there is none of the lightness of tone that is more typical of YA novels.  Yes, there is the awkwardness of teen romance, making new friends, making good decisions and relating to parents, guardians and other adults.  But there is a greater sense of gravitas, not seriousness really, but rather a sense of substance, that the story could be true.  Okay, I know that werewolves don't really exist (don't I?) but Kat Kruger has you believing that The Night Has Teeth provides an accurate account of Connor's experiences, even if somewhat surreal.  All I know is that when I finished The Night Has Teeth, (on two final sentences that will go down in my journal of best endings), I knew I would have to wait until Connor and Arden and the others resolve some issues before Kat Kruger could commit them to paper again. 

I'm wholly prepared for what lies ahead in this journey, because the wolf in the night has teeth.  It has claws, and it's me. (pg. 290)

    ∆      ∆      ∆      ∆      ∆      ∆    

As an aside, the texture and colours of the cover make for a spectacular book jacket, particularly with the torn (clawed?) openings revealing the startling red with succinctly ominous text. Kudos to Fierce Ink Press' jacket designer for nailing this.  I would love to see Quill & Quire feature the development of The Night Has Teeth's cover on its Cover to Cover feature page.  Don't you agree?

Hemlock

by Kathleen Peacock

Katherine Tegen Books (Imprint of HarperCollins)

978-0-06-204865-3

416 pp.

Ages 14+

Available May 8, 2012

(Reviewed from Advance Reader's Edition)

Since the werewolves came out of the mythological closet twelve years earlier, all communities, including Hemlock, have been dealing with accepting those infected with lupine syndrome and the ramifications of their condition.  In Hemlock, which has been home to Mac Dobson since her father, Hank, abandoned her there with her cousin, Tess, three years ago, werewolves have not been a concern.  That is, not until multiple attacks, some fatal, occur within several weeks and culminate with the murder of Amy, Mac's best friend and the granddaughter of Senator John Walsh.  With evidence pointing to a white-haired werewolf, Senator Walsh desperately enlists the services of Brandon Derby and his vigilante Trackers.  Believing that all werewolves are dangerous to regs (uninfected humans), the Trackers, a civilian group usually given free rein by the authorities, violently haul away suspected werewolves and torment anyone who gets in their way.

While the Trackers aggressively pursue infected humans for internment in rehabilitation camps, Mac, her close friend Kyle, and Amy's boyfriend, Jason, all berate themselves for not being there for Amy the night she was killed.  But, each deals differently in the aftermath of her death.  Mac has cryptic discussions with Amy in terrifying nightmares.  Kyle wants to be there for Mac and get closer to her, but he has to deal with his ex, Heather, who hates Mac and keeps demanding Kyle's attention.  And, although Jason's initial reaction is to find comfort in alcohol and outlandish behaviour, his reaction becomes extreme when he decides to join the Trackers. 

As with any great plot, there are secrets withheld from the reader, but it seems everyone is keeping secrets from Mac.  When secrets are revealed, intermittently and usually unceremoniously (as most secrets are), Mac begins to realize that her history affects how she deals with others.  Having a mother who left before her first birthday and living with a father of dubious principles who also abandons her has left Mac reluctant to share too much of herself.  But, she has learned to be watchful, strategic and forbearing, all of which help her make some very astute determinations about Brandon Derby's motives, about Jason's attitudes, and about Amy's death.  As the narrator and central character around which all subplots revolve, Mac carries the story (although all other characters are strong enough to help with this charge).  She is neither naive nor weak, but she is incredulous when she learns more about Kyle, Jason, Amy, and others.  Kathleen Peacock, a new author from New Brunswick (Hemlock is her debut novel), does an exemplary job of developing Mac's voice into that of a bright seventeen-year-old who diligently reflects on the continuously changing circumstances, including the very nature of her friends and friendships.  Nothing Mac decides to do is unbelievable to the reader.  She attacks new dilemmas with honesty and resolve, and willingly accepts the need to amend her actions.

The horror of the werewolf attacks and of the Trackers' vigilantism is tempered with several romances that thankfully stray from typical boy-girl dating.  Surprisingly these budding loves seem completely realistic considering how many young people (and older ones too) are reluctant to share their true feelings.  Rather than comedic misunderstandings feeding the plot, it is the uncertainly and fear of rejection that allow relationships to progress, albeit haphazardly.

Kathleen Peacock makes Mac a true hero.  While Mac, with a little help from her friends, discovers the truth of Amy's death, her story does not end there.  The epilogue, which reveals what Mac feels she must do next in order to evolve into her true self, not the abandoned girl of her childhood, sets up the sequel to Hemlock perfectly.  Personally, I look forward to this next phase in Mac's journey, especially with regards to how Mac, Kyle and Jason resolve their feelings.  Sadly, the official release date for Hemlock is still a few weeks away, and there is no firm release date or even title for the sequel.  Luckily, I'm confident that I'll appreciate the direction Kathleen Peacock will take Mac and her cohorts when the second book of the trilogy is available.