Growing Things and Other Stories: Library Edition

A genre-bending near-future tech nightmare that is as bitingly funny as it is horrifically believable, from the New York Times bestselling author of The Cabin at the End of the World.<BR><BR>Meet Julia Flang, a twenty-something former professional gamer, living with her retired uncle, and working two jobs she doesn't like. Out of the blue, her estranged mother, a CFO for one of the world's largest tech companies, offers her a temp job with a payday Julia can't refuse. One sham interview later, she's offered the job: to chaperone a man in a vegetative state from California to the East Coast. But he's not dead dead: he has an AI mind implanted in his head.<BR><BR>Meet a middle-aged man who wakes within a disorienting hellscape filled with monstrous grotesqueries. Worse than the fluid, morphing reality in which he's trapped, he has no memory of who he is. He certainly doesn't remember getting the rabbit tattoo on his arm. He only knows that he must find a certain person. <BR>Who? He can't remember.<BR><BR>Dead but Dreaming of Electric Sheep is a heady, terrifying genre-bender from one of the most groundbreaking voices in fiction today, exploring the 'I' in AI.

1988, Art Barbara is a painfully shy/socially awkward teenager, underweight, acne-ridden, and suffering from scoliosis when he starts the Pallbearers' Club. Members volunteer as mourners for the homeless and lonely, those with no one else to bury them. Art recruits his former bully, Eddie Patrick, a fellow slacker Cayla, and the mysterious Mercy Brown. Art and Mercy quickly form an intense friendship, but one day Art takes a photo of Mercy, and captures a strange parasitic creature wrapped around her.<BR>

Summer, 1993 - a group of young guerrilla filmmakers spend four weeks making Horror Movie, a notorious, disturbing, art-house horror film. Steeped in mystery and tragedy, the film has taken on a mythic, cult renown, despite only three of the original scenes ever being released to the public. Decades later, a big budget reboot is in the works, and Hollywood turns to the only surviving cast member - the man who played the Thin Kid', the masked teen at the centre of it all. He remembers all too well the secrets buried within the original screenplay, the bizarre events of the filming, and the crossed lines on set. Caught in a nightmare of masks and appearances, facile Hollywood personalities and the strangeness of fan conventions, the Thin Kid spins a tale of past and present, scripts and reality, and what the camera lets us see. But at what cost do we revisit our demons? After all these years, the monster the world never saw will finally be heard.

"Paul Tremblay is on fire. . . .As entertaining and pop-culture savvy as this novel can be, it's emotionally wrenching and truly scary."—Ed Park, author of Pulitzer Prize finalist Same Bed, Different Dreams and An Oral History of AtlantisPhilip K. Dick meets the Coen Brothers in this genre-bending near-future tech nightmare that is as bitingly funny as it is horrifically believable from the New York Times bestselling author of Horror Movie.Meet Julia Flang, a twenty-something former semi-professional gamer, living with her retired uncle, and working two jobs she doesn’t like. Out of the blue, her estranged mother, a CFO for one of the world’s largest tech companies, offers her a temp job with a payday Julia can’t refuse. One sham interview later, she’s offered the job: to chaperone a man in a vegetative state—one with proprietary AI implanted in his head—from California to the East Coast.To sum up in Julia’s own words: “You want me to remote control this dead dude across the country.” In a word, yes. But he’s not dead dead.Meet a middle-aged man who wakes within a disorienting hellscape filled with monstrous grotesqueries. Worse than the fluid, morphing reality in which he’s trapped, he has no memory of who he is. He certainly doesn’t remember getting the rabbit tattoo on his arm. He only knows that he must find a certain person. Who? He can’t remember.Using a cell phone modeled after a video game controller, Julia fumblingly navigates the man she calls “Bernie” from the company campus and onto planes and through one of the largest airports in America. All the while, the man endures an ever-changing and worsening nightmare that offers clues as to who he was—and who he must track down. And as their two lives intertwine, Julia and Bernie become unlikely allies and fugitives on a collision course with reality.Dead but Dreaming of Electric Sheep is a heady, horrific genre-bender from one of the most groundbreaking voices in fiction today."Creepy and unexpectedly humorous. . . .A master storyteller, Tremblay's b(l)ending of genres here truly is a perfect beach read."—NPR

Fans of Stephen King will enjoy this story of a vacationing family terrorised by four strangers who claim to be attempting to either avert or bring about the apocalypse, with an element of domestic drama bringing ample humanity to the end-of-the-world stakes.<BR>

The bone-chilling, instantly New York Times bestselling tale of an unsettling, unbreakable friendship—from acclaimed horror author Paul Tremblay.“All the questions we ask as kids about who we are and what we’re worth take a terrifying turn in this spooky tale of a sinister, inhuman imposter and the nightmares he brings. Tremblay has taken the world of horror for adults by storm, and in his middle-grade debut, once again, he serves up scenes that will make you squirm long after the book is closed.” —M.T. Anderson, National Book Award WinnerWhen Casey Wilson’s parents tell him that his friend is coming for a sleepover, he has no idea who that might be. Ever since the Zoom Incident, everyone treats him like a pariah, and his tics are worse than ever. When Morel appears, he’s not like any friend Casey has ever met. His skin is like clay, and he doesn’t speak. But Casey’s parents are charmed by the strange kid, and it’s nice to have someone to talk to besides his sister, Ally, who is away at college. As his normally loving parents grow distant from Casey, they gush and fawn over Morel. Casey knows something is wrong—but with no end in sight to the sleepover, he’s exhausted. And in the dark, out of the corner of his eye, Morel doesn’t look like a kid at all. . . .- Perfect for Halloween Reading- Ideal for fans of the supernatural- Features light scares

A vacationing family is terrorized by four strangers who claim to be attempting to<BR>either avert or bring about the apocalypse. An intense novel of psychological horror<BR>and suspense that will keep readers guessing as to whether the struggle between the<BR>family and the strangers will not only result in lost lives but ultimately in the end of<BR>the world.