Geek Syndicate Issue 3 | Page 25

zona desert. The shoot’s locations take Kyle to the cult’s original bases in London, France and finally the crime scene where the cult met their bloody end. But when he interviews the remaining survivors, who haven’t broken silence in decades, a series?of uncanny events and unexplained phenomena plague the shoots. And what exactly is it they are managing to record in any place the Temple once resided? Troubling out-of-body experiences and nocturnal visitations, the sudden demise of their interviewees and the discovery of ghastly artefacts, soon pitch Kyle and his oneman crew, into the unnerving realization that they have become entangled in the cult’s hideous legacy. The Forbidden by F. R. Tallis. Published: June 2012 Superstition... Possession ... Hell on Earth When the young and ambitious Doctor Paul Clément?takes a job at a mission hospital on Saint Sébastien he has dreams of finding cures for tropical diseases. What he finds is a place where the black arts are just a way of life. After witnessing the ritualistic murder of a young boy who was allegedly already dead, he is warned never to speak of what he has seen. Back in Paris, Paul’s attentions turn to studying the nervous system and resuscitation using electricity. Paul is told of patients who have apparently died, been brought back to life and, whilst they lay between life and death, witnessed what they believed to be Heaven itself. Using forbidden knowledge he swore never to use, he attempts to see Geek Syndicate collapse. A toxic fuel is slowly choking the land; the omnipotent, machine-powered Lotus Guild is publicly burning those they deem Impure; and the Shogun cares about nothing but his own dominion. Yukiko has always been uneasy in the shadow of power; when she learns the awful truth of what the Shogun has done, both to her country and to her own family, she’s determined to do something about it. Returning to the city, Yukiko and Buruu plan to make the Shogun pay for his crimes – but what can one girl and a flightless griffin do against the might of an empire? Transworld Half Sick of Shadows by David Logan. Published May 2012 On the eve of Granny Hazel’s burial in the back garden, a stranger in his time machine – a machine that bears an uncanny resemblance to a Morris Minor – visits five year-old Edward with a strange request. And Edward agrees to be his friend. ??But Edward is not alone in the world. His twin sister Sophia is about to bring future tragedy upon herself through an all-too-literal misunderstanding of a promise she’s made to their father. ??So while Sophia stays at home, seemingly condemned to spend the rest of her days in The Manse – a world untouched by modern trappings – Edward is sent to boarding school. There he encounters the kind and the 25 what everyone else has seen, but something goes wrong. When Paul returns to the living could it be possible he brings something else back with him, an unspeakable evil so powerful it can never be banished? Is this paranoia, a madness slowly consuming him, or has Doctor Paul Clément witnessed Hell? Stormdancer by Jay Kristoff. Published: June 2012 A dystopian steampunk fantasy set against a backdrop of feudal Japan Griffins are supposed to be extinct. So when Yukiko and her warrior father Masaru are sent to capture one for the Shogun, they fear that their lives are over. Everyone knows what happens to those who fail him, no matter how hopeless the task. But the mission proves far less impossible, and far more deadly, than anyone expects – and soon Yukiko finds herself stranded: a young woman alone in her country’s last wilderness, with only a furious, crippled griffin for company. But trapped together in the forest, Yukiko and Buruu soon discover a friendship that neither of them expected. Meanwhile, the country around them verges on the brink of