Packed with superheroes, supervillains, and epic showdowns between good and evil, TheUnforgettable Logan Foster from debut author Shawn Peters shows that sometimes being a hero is just about being yourself.
Logan Foster has pretty much given up on the idea of ever being adopted. It could have something to with his awkward manner, his photographic memory, or his affection for reciting curious facts, but whatever the cause, Logan and his “PP’s” (prospective parents) have never clicked.
Then everything changes when Gil and Margie arrive. Although they aren’t exactly perfect themselves—Gil has the punniest sense of humor and Margie’s cooking would have anyone running for the hills—they genuinely seem to care.
But it doesn’t take Logan long to notice some very odd things about them. They are out at all hours, they never seem to eat, and there’s a part of the house that is protected by some pretty elaborate security.
No matter what Logan could have imagined, nothing prepared him for the truth: His PP’s are actually superheroes, and they’re being hunted down by dastardly forces. Logan’s found himself caught in the middle in a massive battle and the very fate of the world may hang in the balance. Will Logan be able to find a way to save the day and his new family?
My 10yo and I read The Unforgettable Logan Foster as part of the Owl Crate Jr book box. While he isn’t a reluctant reader – he is reluctant to try new authors or series. So we made a deal that he had to read one month’s book before he could open the next box. Once he started The Unforgettable Logan Foster, he had a hard time putting it down. Superheroes combined with a kid that is “different than the other kids, like I’m a little different, but in a different way than I’m different” really drew him into the story. Now he can’t wait for more in the series.
The other part of our deal was that I would read the book when he was done so we could talk about it. What I enjoyed most with the very untraditional family unit Logan found himself adopted into. Throw in a very untraditional neighborhood friend, and all the unusual types built a beautiful picture.
Throw in a fun adventure to defeat a super villain and his friends, and you have the makings for a great MG adventure. Some of the heroes reminded me a little of contemporary comic books with a fun and colorful twist. And with a few really great surprise reveals (I didn’t see them coming at all), I found the book hard to put down as well.
“Soren went home.” The voice is male, low, and dark. If possible, he sounds even more ruthless than Soren, and my body reacts immediately. I haven’t even seen this guy. Just three small words, and my body is excited. It clearly has no sense of self-preservation. I had thought this reaction was exclusive to Soren, but no, it’s just men like Soren. With my body obviously against my survival, it’s a miracle I haven’t already ended up dead in a ditch somewhere.
Like Soren, this man has an overpowering ruthless energy that I can feel heavy on the air around me. It makes every nerve ending light up in response with the desire to be consumed and ripped apart by this new storm.
I can feel it in the air. He is darkness. I am light. He is guilty. I am innocent. He is war. I am love.
I’m sick. There probably isn’t even a diagnosis for what’s wrong with me.
I wish I could control my body’s reaction. There are just some things that set me off in this primal animal way. Intellectually I know this man may really hurt me. Or he may be gross. Or he may be any number of horrible things, but even so, I’m wet. He’s cast in too much shadow for me to see his face, which calls back my fantasy from this morning, something else I definitely don’t need to be thinking about right now. I’m not an idiot. I know I’m in real trouble here, and that this isn’t some fantasy that’s come to life. But I feel pulled into him as though the storm can provide me shelter.
KITTY THOMAS writes dark stories that play with power and have unconventional HEAs. She began publishing in early 2010 with her bestselling COMFORT FOOD and is considered one of the original authors of the dark romance subgenre.
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Title: The Indigo Author: Heather Siegel Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Jett Hart, a 16-year-old girl from New Jersey, refuses to accept the diagnosis that her mother is brain-dead. Yes, Mom’s long-comatose body seems like an empty shell. But there was that split-second, weird time Jett swears she lifted out from her own body and travelled to an indigo-colored, starry space, where she felt Mom’s presence.
Now, as Jett’s caretaking Aunt threatens to pull Mom’s life support, Jett must find this mysterious indigo place again and return her mother to her body before it’s too late. The bad news is that only her schoolmate Farold — who may or may not give off a more-than-friends vibe — believes she can do this. The good news is that he’s an amateur quantum physicist in training and has some ideas about how to help Jett get back “up there.”
Even if Jett manages to find Mom in the “indigo,” can she bring her back to her body? While also staying connected to her own “empty shell” below? And, what if . . . someone is trying to stop her?
A teen thriller offering astral projection cosmology, life cords, parallel universes, and wormholes, THE INDIGO is a wild trip through one person’s consciousness “above,” her interconnected reality “below,” and the psychological and potentially fatal dangers of being disconnected from both.
Day 787. I sponge Mom’s stringy arms and pronate her elbows. Suction saliva from her white gums, careful not to disturb the psst-psst of the breathing tube. I attach cotton-ball-size muscle-stimulation pads, all forty of them, to her biceps and triceps, her deltoids and extensors, her flexors and hamstrings. As the pads pulse against muscle atrophy, I crayon Chapstick on her lips, rub cream down her pointed nose and waxen cheek skin, brush her dark hair splayed over the starched pillow. I leave the waste bags for the nurses but check the connections out of habit — the tubes to the catheter and colostomy bag, the one to her nutrients. Then I sit, holding her hand, pretending to talk to her for the sake of passersby, even though I know she’s not listening. Not even in the room.
Her body is an empty vessel. A coat on a hanger waiting for her arms to slip in. A mollusk on the beach, abandoned by its host. An empty carton of milk I’m here to make sure they don’t throw out.
Because when I find her — and bring her back — she will need her container.
They’ve told me it’s dangerous to think this way. Psychologically damaging, Aunt Margaret has claimed. A byproduct of grief, the therapists have said. Denial is a natural defense mechanism, Dr. Horn has counseled. “But we can’t ignore the reality of what the scans tell us.”
He means the X-rays of Mom’s gray folded matter. The regions of her brain that still incite spontaneous reflexes — causing her arm to jerk here, her leg to twitch there. “All seemingly normal manifestations of brainstem function,” he’s told me repeatedly. “But should not be confused with actual brainstem function. Without which she has little chance of waking up.”
I can’t fault him for thinking this way. The guy’s a neurologist — his business is brains.
But I know there has to be more to us than our bodies and brains.
Call it what you want — a consciousness, a soul, a spirit, a light being. It’s the thing countless comatose patients swear gave them the ability to live whole other lives while on respirators. The thing that philosophers and spiritualists spent their lives writing about. The thing that makes us who we are. And maybe even fuels the brainstem. And Mom’s brainstem went missing two years ago the moment she crashed her car.
Heather Siegel is the author of THE KING & THE QUIRKY, and OUT FROM THE UNDERWORLD. She teaches academic and creative writing, holds an MFA from The New School University, and lives with her family in Southern Florida.
