Free Kindle ebooks: Class Heroes

Author Stephen Henning is letting readers get their hands on both of his books, A Class Apart and What Happened in Witches Wood for free on February 5th and 6th.  This only applies to the Amazon kindle editions, but if you don't have a kindle you can still read the books on other devices that allow apps.  The links are to the US editions, but this offer includes the UK editions as well.  I believe Canadian accounts can still get the US book from that site, but I know they've made some changes so don't quote me on that.

I read and really enjoyed A Class Apart, and What Happened in Witches Wood is on my soon to be read pile.

Here's the synopsis for book one, to whet your appetite.

Teenage twins James and Samantha Blake are caught up in a seemingly random terrorist bombing while on a school trip. Many of their friends are killed. When the twins wake up in hospital, their lives have changed forever.

The doctors are amazed at the speed with which James and Sam recover from their injuries and, when the twins begin to exhibit extraordinary powers, it is obvious that something incredible has happened.

As James and Sam attempt to overcome their fears and embrace their new abilities, a series of murders and disappearances start plaguing the hospital. The twins aren't the only ones with special abilities and it becomes apparent that someone is coming for them.

Will James and Sam be able to survive the nightmare into which they have been plunged? Who, or what, is behind the murders at the hospital? And was that terrorist incident quite so random after all?

Book Review: A Class Apart by Stephen Henning

Pros: very interesting characters, good pacing, fair amount of suspense and action, compelling

Cons: story jumps between heads a lot, actions seem sped up at times

For Parents: some violence and deaths, no language or sexual content

The school bus 14 year old twins James and Samantha Blake are on is bombed, while returning from a field trip.  The survivors are taken to Brent Valley General Hospital where strange things start happening.  The twins discover they have somehow developed super powers and that someone is after them.

Despite the media blackout surrounding the hospital, Jasmin Sharma of 24/7 Interactive News is going for a big story and she doesn't care what laws she has to break or who she has to cozy up to in order to get it.

The twins are interesting protagonists, and Mr. Henning does a good job of showing their good and bad sides (how Sam is bullied but won't fight back, how James is popular but feels like he should do more to protect his less popular sister).  Even more interesting - mostly due to her duplitious nature - is Jasmin.  She's beautiful, intelligent and ruthless.  Minor characters are also fairly well fleshed out, giving the story nice depth.

In many ways this reminded me of the X-Men storyline that introduced Kitty Pride (the Dark Phoenix Saga).  The kids doubt their sanity when odd things happen and only slowly realize that they now have special abilities.

The pacing is good, with time for the characters to question what's going on in the hospital and for action packed scenes, making the book hard to put down.  The climax itself is pulse pounding if a bit over the top.

While jumping between heads to know what everyone is thinking was common in the past, most writing advice guides now recommend page breaks if you're going to change heads, in order to maintain clarity.  I had no problem following the jumps but other readers may find the technique confusing.

There were a few scenes where the action seemed sped up.  For example there's a scene where Sam is trying to put out a fire.  The implication is that she's trying hard to do this for several minutes, and yet she manages to successfully put it out in the same sentence that explains how hard this is for her. 

In the end it was a quick, fun read.  And while the book ties up one plot arc, there is definitely more to the story. 

Book Excerpt - A Class Apart

I don't normally read self-published books (I'm a bit of a snob that way, I find most of the ones I've seen have been rife with grammatical errors and/or in severe need of editing).  So it's with great pleasure that I post this excerpt from Stephen Henning's self-published novel, A Class Apart.  I'll be posting my review of it tomorrow, but wanted to show off its prologue (with the permission of the author), which was so well written I agreed to give the book a chance.  The rest of the novel is just as well written, and is the start of a series involving teens who acquire super powers.

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Prologue

Sunday 12 June

Samantha Blake sat up in her hospital bed. She tried to read the article about her on the 24/7 Interactive News website, but her eyes kept flicking nervously to the door of her private room. Nobody was there.

      The article had been updated only five minutes ago. It was chilling and surreal to read about the events that she was experiencing – as they were actually happening. The text flowed across the screen of her phone.

      Breaking News – School Bus Bombing – Were Twins Targeted?

      Fears that teenage twins were targeted in terror attack, amid reports of SECOND strike in victims’ hospital!

      Sam could feel her heart thumping and her pulse quickening as she read the piece. Targeted? Really? Her and James? They must be the twins referred to, as there hadn’t been any others on the coach. Surely the bombing hadn’t been an attack on them? It was stupid! Who would want to target them?

      Sam looked around nervously. The report claimed there been an attack on the hospital. Within the isolation of these four walls, she had heard nothing, seen nothing. She was alone, but she could almost imagine an assassin in the bathroom, or a bomb under her bed. She had no way of being sure, because she could not move from the bed or leave the room. She wished her brother, James, was here.

      Eight days ago it had been their 14th birthday. They’d had a big party with all their school friends. Many of them were no longer alive.

      Now she lay in this hospital bed, cold, alone, scared and hungry.

      She scrolled further down the page. There was another video report, but this one was from three hours ago.

      Mystery Death Dive at Bomb Survivors’ Hospital

      Bosses refuse to confirm whether a teenage boy has fallen out of 36th-storey window at Brent Valley General

      Sam watched the video, her heart in her mouth. The reporter was standing outside the hospital, pointing at fragments of glass on the ground and a broken window at the top of the huge building. The reporter said that eyewitnesses had claimed that a body had come through the window, although the whereabouts of the body was unknown and unexplained.

      Three hours ago, James had told her he was heading up to the 36th floor. That was the last she had heard from him. Could it have been James who had fallen out of the window?

      Sam jumped in fright. Through the glass panels in her door, she saw a shape. A figure in the corridor. She couldn’t see who it was. Friend or enemy?

      Samantha Blake shrank down into her bed. Even with the amazing things that she could do, she had reason to be fearful.

      The door opened, and Sam breathed a sigh of relief. It was a friend. Everything was ok.

      And then all of a sudden, it wasn’t...

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The Author has also set up some cool websites, one for the book itself, one for 24/7 Interactive News (with a few 'news broadcasts') and a blog written by the twins.