by Linda Welch, author of the Whisperings series, Along Came a Demon and The Demon Hunters, and the Novels of the Systems

Readers of all ages fell in love with fourteen-year-old Katie McCabe when they discovered MISFIT MCCABE, the first book in LK Gardner-Griffie’s young adult series. Now they can follow Katie’s adventures in book two, NOWHERE FEELS LIKE HOME.

In MISFIT MCCABE, when Katie’s father became seriously ill she went to live with her Uncle Charley, cousins Matt, Mark and Sarah. Almost before she could take the next breath, she lost her father, her home and her friends. Life for Katie would never be the same. Then Katie got into the worse trouble of her life when her new arch-enemy, bully Harvey Denton Jr., along with his cohort Emma, abducted Katie. Harvey then took Katie into the hills, where he left her bound and gagged, but not before pushing her into a river. Katie almost drowned. Trying to find her way home, she slipped and broke her ankle and then was bitten by a rattlesnake. Katie struggled back to civilization. NOWHERE FEELS LIKE HOME picks up the story where MISFIT MCCABE left off.

After an extract from Katie’s diary, which serves to reacquaint readers with the events in MISFIT MCCABE, chapter one begins poignantly with Katie in a delirious sleep, reliving almost drowning in the river. She hears the voices of her father and mother, only to wake and remember they are dead. From this first page to the last, readers are pulled back into Katie’s world and all who inhabit it.

Katie learns that her war with Harvey Jr. is only the tip of the iceberg in an ongoing feud with the Dentons, and escalates an already tense situation. She is besieged by unexpected, unwelcome, confusing emotions which appear out of nowhere in the form of sudden fits of raging anger or overwhelming sorrow. Cousin Sarah explains that this is a reaction to the trauma Katie experienced, and teaches Katie ways to cope. Underneath it all, Katie faces the same confusion known to fourteen-year-old girls the world over as they mature; she has the same questions. Sarah and Katie discuss topics important to a growing teen in a way I wish my mother had talked to me.

In fact, Cousin Sarah is a major player in NOWHERE FEELS LIKE HOME: a confidante, elder sister, substitute-mother and friend. At the same time, she doesn’t give in to feisty Katie’s tantrums an inch.

To ease Katie’s boredom, Sarah shares moments of her childhood and early teens. Katie is surprised and delighted to know Sarah was very close to her father Sam and mother Marie, and learns of events her father never mentioned. Through Sarah, we get to know the McCabe brothers, Sam, Charley and, to a lesser degree, Sarah’s father John. Katie realizes that young Sarah was not so different; she, like Katie, had her moments of rebellion.

To further complicate Katie’s life, she now has a boyfriend. Of course, that would not in Katie’s opinion be a complication, if she and Tom were not under Sarah’s eagle eyes all the time. When her best friend Timmy turns up at the McCabe farm, she realizes that their relationship will never be the same, either.

I waited for toad-like Harvey Jr. to reappear, and LK Gardner-Griffie does not disappoint. When Harvey re-enters Katie’s life, he does so with a vengeance.

In NOWHERE FEELS LIKE HOME, Katie gains maturity and (reluctantly) learns the art of compromise. Although at the beginning of Katie’s story she feels that “nowhere feels like home,” she learns that Uncle Charley, Sarah, Matt and Mark have her best interests at heart. She is family, and they teach and protect her the best way they are able.

After reading a preview of the next book, I can’t wait for the author to publish the third in the MISFIT McCABE series!

Copyright © 2009
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$ 8.50 Paperback
$ 1.99 Kindle edition & Smashwords edition
248 pages

We first met Tiff Banks in Along Came a Demon. During the course of the first book, Tiff Banks is established as a person with the ability to talk with ghosts, who are referred to as shades. Tiff used her gift to assist the Clarion Police Department with murder investigations. That career came to an abrupt halt when she accused one of Clarion PD’s golden boys, Royal Mortenson, of being a murderer based on the say so of the ghost of a little boy. The actual murderer was Royal’s brother, who looks so much like him Tiff had difficulty in telling them apart, so she couldn’t blame the shade of a little boy for getting it wrong. The police department was a little less forgiving. And Tiff didn’t even tell the police department that Royal is a demon. Okay, so that is what Tiff has been calling those beings which have metallic looking hair, glittering eyes, and pointy teeth. Although, Royal has had his teeth capped.

Since Royal is now Tiff’s lover and partner in the detective agency they have opened, Tiff learned Royal is actually a Gelpha. But she continues to think of him and others of his kind as demons. The Demon Hunters opens with a comic scene in which Tiff convinces Royal to go after a kidnapped cat for the reward money, because she was feeling the pinch of being out of a semi-regular consulting fee. After speaking with a rather nasty ghost called Freddy, they got a lead on where the catnappers were located. Tiff then uses her bad-tempered Scottie, MacKlutzy to bring the catnapper out of the apartment while Royal, who has the ability to move at lightning speed, rushed in and out with the cat. Having little dogs of my own, I identified with the description of MacKlutzy squaring off with the catnapper.

If there’s one thing Mac hates worse than cats, it’s being threatened. He recognized that tone of voice. Terriers are fearless. They literally do not perceive any distinction in size or bulk. Something stood between him and a cat and that something threatened him. Mac attacked.

Following this fun, lighthearted case, Royal calls Tiff to come meet some new clients, Gia Sabato and Daven Clare. Gia Sabato just happens to be an enormously successful author who sprang out of nowhere eighteen months prior to the start of the story. Tiff is surprised when the case ends up being about the abduction of a Clarion Latino former gangsta, who is the lover of Gia Sabato. Tiff doesn’t really like her new clients and suspects them of being Gelpha in disguise. On top of that Royal is acting very strange and keeping secrets from her. Add to the intrigue, the mysterious arrival of a nineteenth century journal kept by a fifteen year old British girl on the travels to Burma, and you have a case getting more bizarre by the moment.

When Gia and Daven unexpectedly arrive at Tiff’s house and waltz right in, Jack and Mel, Tiff’s resident ghosts, go ballistic and try to attack them and force them to leave. And even stranger, MacKlutzy, who never met an ankle he didn’t want to bite, runs away from them as quickly as he can and acts scared out of his wits. Even though she is the one who hired Royal and Tiff to find Rio, Gia Sabato doesn’t want Tiff to have too much information about the disappearance. Frustrated by being kept in the dark by her clients, and fearful her relationship with Royal could be on the way out, Tiff just wants this case to be over. Once Tiff finally gets them to let her in on what is really going on, she finds out someone is seeking out and killing demons and their Dark Cousins. No one will tell Tiff exactly what a Dark Cousin is, but she quickly figures out that they really don’t get along with Gelpha and that it is taboo to even mention what a dark cousin is. Join Tiff and Royal on their hair-raising adventure to find The Demon Hunters.

I first read The Demon Hunters toward the beginning of the year, put together a draft of the review and scheduled it. Linda Welch contacted me and requested we postpone the review as she was making some changes to the manuscript. I was very interested in seeing what those changes might entail. Being a confirmed tweaker of my own novels, I completely understood the request and tried to wait patiently for the changes to be completed. Before I received the revised manuscript, I noticed the cover had been changed. The original cover is depicted to the right, and I think the cover pictured at the top of this review is a definite improvement. After reading the book, I understood what the original cover illustrated, but I don’t think it would have immediately grabbed the attention of potential readers.

The bulk of the changes to the actual content of the book are additional scenes which definitely add to the overall story. There is an added scene which takes the reader back to the first time Tiff ever saw a ghost. This was good back story information, and something I had been wondering about. Since Tiff didn’t see ghosts until she was an adult, the shock of it had to have an impact. Welch also takes the time to tie up a loose end or two from the first novel in the series, as well as building some additional animosity between Tiff and her client, Gia Sabato. All in all, the revisions were definitely worthwhile, and worth the wait for the now completed product.

The first time I read The Demon Hunters, it was in PDF format on my laptop. This time, I transferred the PDF to my Kindle to read it. The PDF conversion did okay for the most part, but there were a few issues, such as anything in italics appeared to have removed the appropriate spacing. Any dashes showed up as some sort of character in a box, and some of the formatting was off, such as paragraph indents, and some carriage return issues. Nothing significant enough to drive me back to the laptop to read the book. One of the benefits of using the Kindle to read the book over the PDF format is the ability to highlight text and input some notes, so I was able to bring up my notes to help me construct the review, a very useful feature.

Linda Welch pens her characters with authority, and you are instantly taken into the world of Tiff Banks and her demon lover, Royal. Her story contains action from start to finish. You feel like you know Tiff from the instant you pick up the book and want to stay with her as she jets all over this world and through otherworlds in search of answers. I’ll be anxiously waiting for the next installment in the Whisperings series.

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Originally reviewed for the LL Book Review.

by Linda Welch, author of the Novels of the Systems and the Whisperings novellas

Many a year has passed since I was a 14 year old year girl so being taken back into the mind of one was a novel experience. And LK Gardner-Griffie does a remarkable job of portraying a teen’s thoughts and emotions through Katie’s narration. I could so relate to Katie McCabe, and so will teens who read Misfit McCabe, and any adult who (honestly) recalls their teen years. You must remember when you thought your hometown was boring and didn’t want to be stuck there your whole life. When you needed so passionately to be seen as an individual and not an extension of your family. When running away when you’d messed up seemed the best option, even though you knew that would result in a worse punishment than if you’d stayed put.

Have you ever looked at your own teen and wondered, why are you so contrary? Just what is in that head of yours? I couldn’t help but like Katie McCabe even though she is about as contrary as a teen can be. The teen years are terribly complex, while they try to cope with emotional and physical changes and conflicting feelings. I think teens who read Misfit McCabe will identify with her.

I won’t go into the plot as other reviewers have already outlined it. I will say that in Misfit McCabe, Katie’s world is turned upside down and she must learn to live with a terrible loss, learn to accept the solace and friendship she is offered, and is plunged into many difficult and, at times, dangerous situations. Through it all, Katie grows as a person.

Misfit McCabe is beautifully written and Katie is an engaging central character. LK Gardner-Griffie truly understands young teens and takes you into their world, with all their insecurities and uncertainties.
I’m sure that more adventures await Katie, more “growing pains” and more lessons from life, in the coming sequel to Misfit McCabe. I can’t wait to read it.

I have been an avid mystery fan for much of my life. I read before going to sleep every night and the books that usually make up that reading material are mysteries of the cozy type. Agatha Christie, P D James, Elizabeth Peters, Ngaio Marsh, Sara Paretsky, Martha Grimes, and the list goes on. When I saw that Linda Welch had requested a review for her psi-fi mystery, Along Came A Demon, I leapt at the chance to read and review it. I was not disappointed.

Tiff Banks, nicknamed the Ice Queen by the Clarion police department for her tall stature and ice blonde hair, works as a consultant for the police in murder cases. She has told them that she is a psychic, but in actuality, she sees dead people as flesh and blood and they whisper to her. Tiff, who hates to be called Tiffany because of the image that projects, was orphaned as a baby, grew up in a variety of foster homes, and always felt she was a little different than everyone else. Happier being by herself than with a group of people, Tiff left Utah as soon as she was able and went from place to place and job to job. Until, after landing in San Francisco, boom, out of nowhere she started seeing and being able to talk to dead people. She returned to Utah to the small town of Clarion in the hopes that there wouldn’t be too many murdered people trying to get her attention. Unfortunately for her, she moved into a house where there were two ghosts in residence, as well as two who lived on her street. So much for trying to get away from them.

Along Came A Demon starts with Tiff being told by Jack and Mel, her ghost couple, that there is a naked woman dripping on her front grass. Tiff is cranky that she has to deal with a dead person before she can even get her morning coffee

“A naked wet woman in the garden. Dripping wet.”
I sighed and turned to lean against the counter. I would rather she were an escaped lunatic wandered into the neighborhood than what she really was. Although why she was wet on that chilly November morning was anyone’s guess.
“I’ve been watching her from the bedroom window,” Mel said, coming through the door from the hallway, mussing up her permanently mussed red hair with one hand. “She’s been standing there, wet, for half an hour.”
Not a disorientated stranger in the wrong back yard. Not an escaped loony. Worse. One of them. I sighed again. I did not want to deal with it that early in the morning. “She’ll have to wait till after I’ve had my coffee.”

Tiff was trying to figure out how the naked woman came to be on her grass as usually, the dead are bound to where they passed. Lindy Marchant passed away in the apartments behind Tiff’s house, and she is concerned about her son. Tiff promises to find out about her son so that hopefully, Lindy will leave her alone, as she doesn’t want to live with a naked woman in her orchard. The only problem is that once she checks with the Clarion police department, it appears that Lindy Marchant had no son.

Not willing to give up, Tiff requests to search the apartment. Under the refrigerator she finds a drawing by Lawrence, which is given to the police to goad them into searching for the missing child. So starts the twisted case which involves the missing child Lawrence, which blossoms into a nationwide case where over 200 boys born on November 9, 2002 had gone missing.

In addition to being able to see the murdered, Tiff can also see the otherworldly, whom she had heard about from her psychic friend, Lynn.

Lynn was trying to be ethnically sensitive when she call them the Otherworldy. That was too much of a mouthful for me – I called them demons. Not that I thought they were creatures from Hell – I didn’t know what they were or where they came from. They could be aliens from outer space for all I knew. But with their pointed teeth and glimmering eyes, demon seemed a fitting description.

And a little later on, Welch provides some more description of her demons.

I would never call a demon cute. Incredibly handsome. Charming. Deadly. Not to be trusted. According to Lynn, they did not blatantly lie but could do so by omission when it suited them. And you could ask them a question and they would answer in such a way that, without exactly lying, they didn’t give you the truth.

Tiff stays as far away from these demons as she can, but to her chagrin is partnered with Royal Mortenson, of the Clarion PD to work on the missing child case, and he is a demon. While wishing that she could shoot him instead of partnering with him, Tiff becomes suspicious of Royal, who has been moving from police department to police department, never staying too long in one location. She suspects that he may be involved in this missing children case from an inside perspective.

Linda Welch pens a engaging tale, full of action and adventure. A definite page turner full of twists to keep you guessing until the end.

Originially reviewed for the LL Book Review.

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