Disclosure / Disclaimer: I received this ebook free of charge,from St Martin's Press, via Netgalley, for review purposes on this blog. No other compensation, monetary or in kind, has been received or implied for this post. Nor was I told how to post about it, all opinions are my own.
Good news my book loving readers!
BEASTS OF EXTRAORDINARY CIRCUMSTANCE comes out TODAY!
Let me refresh your memory about the book:
Orphaned, raised by wolves, and the proud owner of a horned pig named Merlin, Weylyn Grey knew he wasn’t like other people. But when he single-handedly stopped that tornado on a stormy Christmas day in Oklahoma, he realized just how different he actually was. As amazing as these powers may appear, they tend to manifest themselves at inopportune times and places, jeopardizing not only his own life, but the life of Mary, the woman he loves.
BEASTS OF EXTRAORDINARY CIRCUMSTANCE tells the story of Weylyn Grey’s life from the perspectives of the people who knew him, loved him, and even a few who thought he was just plain weird. Although he doesn’t stay in any of their lives for long, he leaves each of them with a story to tell: great storms that evaporate into thin air; fireflies that make phosphorescent honey; a house filled with spider webs and the strange man who inhabits it. There is one story, however, that Weylyn wishes he could change: his own. But first he has to muster enough courage to knock on Mary’s front door
How about a Book Excerpt?:
“A betting man can lose a dollar. It’s the man he bets on that can lose an eye.” My mother would say this with a confidence that suggested there were no other possible outcomes, that there were thousands of one-eyed boys out there apologizing to their mothers for not
taking their advice.
I, remarkably, still had both my eyes despite my impulse to hurl myself off things that were often a generous distance from the ground. Some of my other hobbies included running with sharp objects, lighting fires, and lighting sharp objects on fire and launching them
into the sky with my slingshot. So, naturally, when it was my turn in Truth or Dare, my friends never had to ask.
“Dare!” I hollered and head-butted a tree.
The other kids laughed. That was my favorite part.
“I dare you to . . .” Mike looked around the forest for something I hadn’t yet climbed, eaten, or peed on. One time, he puked after I made him eat a worm, so I ate ten worms and a beetle just to make him look like a baby in front of pretty Ruby S.
“This’d better be good,” Ruby said as she perched herself on a tree stump like it was box seats at the opera, pointing her candy heart nose at the ceiling as she admired the crown molding.
Mike thought for a moment longer, then flashed me a wily grin.
“Did you hear about the thing that ate Gretchen’s dog?”
“Again?” I scoffed. Mike’s cousin Gretchen was always making up stories. Her most recent string of lies featuring beloved family pets meeting strange and untimely demises. She was pretty weird.
“This one’s real!” Mike insisted. “Charlie got off his leash and started sniffing around this old cabin by the creek. She tried to call him back, but he wouldn’t come. Then like a minute later, she saw this half-man, half-spider thing looking back at her through the win-
dow, and she bolted.”
Ruby gasped and leaned forward on her stump. “She just left Charlie there?”
Mike nodded and continued, “She showed me the place. It’s creepy. Covered in cobwebs and stuff. I wanted to look inside, but Gretchen started crying ’cause she didn’t want me leaving her there by herself. She’s scared of spiders.”
“I think you’re the one who’s afraid of spiders,” I said, wiggling my fingers like they were eight hairy legs.
Mike didn’t take the bait. He leveled his gaze on me and said, “I dare you to touch it.”
“What? The cabin?”
Mike nodded, searching my face for signs of fear. “What d’ya say?Truth or—”
“Dare.”
“That’s it.” Mike pointed to a ramshackle cabin made of splintered, gray wood. The windows were dark and shrouded by cobwebs. It appeared no one was home.
This was going to be easy. “So, I just have to walk up and touch it?” I asked.
Mike hesitated, clearly thrown off by how unfazed I was.
“Yeah . . . but you have to keep your hand on it for at least twenty seconds.”
I almost laughed. This was weak, even for Mike.
“Guys, look,” Ruby said, pointing to a small flock of sparrows that had settled on the roof of the cabin.
“What is it?” I asked, failing to see what was so interesting about a bunch of birds.
“Just watch,” she said.
One by one, the birds beat their wings, but none of them lifted off. It was as if something was anchoring them by their tiny wishbone feet. They furiously flapped and chirped for help as their heads jump-cut from one angle to the next, searching the sky for hawks
or eagles.
“Poor birds!” Ruby cared enough to exclaim, but not enough to do something about it. She turned to me. “You have to save them.”
“Yeah, Roarke. Save them.” Mike nudged me forward.
For the first time in my life, I hesitated. I didn’t hesitate when I drove my uncle’s truck when he left it running in the driveway, or when I caught that snake and wore it like a necktie. But something about this was different. My heart fluttered; my pulse raced. I was . . .
“What’s wrong? Scared Old Man Spider’s gonna eat you?”
“No!” I sounded more defensive than I’d have liked. I could see the other kids doubting me, Ruby doubting me.
I head-butted the nearest tree, took one last look at Ruby’s candy heart nose, and ran to my almost certain doom.
I slowed to a stop within spitting distance of the cabin—twenty--three feet, my personal best. I made sure the coast was clear before I pulled myself onto the branch of a sagging elm and shimmied over to the eaves of Old Man Spider’s roof. Then I realized what was keeping the birds from leaving. Most of the cottage’s roof was missing, and in its place was what looked like a tarp made of spider’s silk.
I carefully placed my weight on one of the several rotten two-by-fours that remained of the original roof and went to work freeing the birds with my Swiss Army knife, cutting the threads that bound their tiny feet while being careful not to step on the sticky stuff myself.
I could see Ruby from where I was, so I decided to make a show of it. I leaped from board to board, bird to bird, cutting them loose and throwing my arms in the air as if I had performed some kind of magic trick.
Ruby’s lips were moving, probably saying something like, “Oh! Did you see that? Roarke is so brave.” When all the birds were free, I took a bow and wondered if I’d get a kiss later. Then came time for my final trick: the Disappearing Act. Like a trapdoor, the board beneath my feet gave way, and I fell.
I braced myself for the landing I had nailed a hundred times before from the tops of trees, roofs, and bridges, but it never came. I found myself cradled in a hammock of spider silk not three feet from the ground. I had fallen into Old Man Spider’s trap.
I struggled to break free but only succeeded in making myself more tangled. Where was my knife? Not in my pocket. I eventually spotted it suspended several feet above me from a single thread of silk. I could see the webbing had caught the blade, not the handle, so
all I could do was wait as gravity cut through the thread and hope it didn’t land on any part of me that contained a vital organ.
As my eyes adjusted to the dark, my surroundings revealed themselves. The room itself was spartan—the only pieces of furniture were a kitchen table and a sofa bed with springs sticking out of the mattress. It was what was above eye level that was cluttered. Spoons,
toothbrushes, socks, tweezers, tennis rackets, and other household miscellany hung suspended in long, sticky tendrils that dangled from large sheets of cobweb on the ceiling. It was as if all those items had gotten stuck at some point and whoever lived here just hadn’t bothered to cut them down.
I heard a shuffling noise behind me. My heart raced as I imagined a giant half-man, half-spider pinning me down with its hairy arms as it prepared to devour me headfirst. Luckily, the thing that found me was no mutant human-spider hybrid, but entirely man: two
legs, two arms, two eyes, hair mostly concentrated on his scalp. He also had two pant legs and two sleeves—both of which were soiled and frayed—and a long, salt-and-pepper beard that he most likely used as a napkin from the amount of food particles that were nestled in it. I guess he wasn’t so much old as he was dirty, although I could see how it might be hard to tell from a distance.
“What’s this?” His look of surprise suggested he had never seen a child before.
“Get away from me!” I shouted and struggled against the webbing that bound me.
“You’ll pardon my asking, but this is my house. Why do you ask that I remove myself from it when you are the one dropping in unannounced?”
“I’m not scared of you!”
The man once again looked surprised. “And why should you be?”
“Because! You . . . you’re a villain!”
“A villain?”
“You trap animals in your web and eat them!” I said bluntly.
“I think you have me confused with someone else. Have you tried Myra Oswald on South Street? She’s an odd one.”
“What about . . . kids?”
“Of course not! Eating children is a ghastly business.”
My muscles relaxed a little. “Then why do you live in this creepy place?”
“Because I needed a place to stay and it was available. The roof needed some patching-up, so my eight-legged friends offered to fix it for me. Would you like something to eat? Cheese? Watermelon?”
I liked both cheese and watermelon, and Old Man Spider didn’t seem so bad, but I wanted out of that web.
“No, thanks. Could you help cut me out? My knife got stuck.”
He gazed up at the hole in his ceiling. “What were you doing up there, anyway?”
I told him about the birds, the bet, and Mike.
“I tell them not to land on the roof, but they keep doing it. You could say they’re a little flighty.” He paused like actors do in sitcoms after they’ve told a joke, only I had no idea what the joke was.
“Never mind,” he added flatly.
“Can you get me outta here or not?”
“Of course, of course!” Old Man Spider went to work untangling my mess. “This might take a while. As you can see, when things get caught, I usually just leave them where they are.”
I glanced at a cheese grater hanging not ten inches from my face and wondered if he just stood in the middle of the living room to grate his cheese.
“What is your name, young man?”
“Roarke.”
“Roarke, Roarke . . .” The man ran off and rummaged through a kitchen drawer. He pulled out a leather-bound book and flipped through it. “Rachel, Randy, Reginald, Ronald. No Roarke. You’re the first!” He excitedly scribbled something in the book. “I try not to repeat names. You don’t know how many Johns I’ve told to skedaddle! My goal is to know one person of every name. I haven’t met another Weylyn, yet. That’s my name—Weylyn Grey,” he said,shaking my hand. His name suited him. He had gray eyes that shone
like fish scales in the light.
The web was starting to make my skin itch. “I really gotta go home.”
“Of course. My apologies.” Weylyn got back to work.
I hoped my mom had bought more chocolate milk. Maybe she’d let me have some after she made me try on that eye patch again and asked me how I’d like to have one of my own.
“So, what’s a smart boy like you doing climbing on people’s roofs? You could’ve hurt yourself.”
“I’ve done much crazier stuff than that.”
I told him some of my best stories: the one about the sewer and the train tracks and the neighbor’s dogs. Weylyn seemed unimpressed.
“What? You got something better?”
Weylyn smiled. “I was young once, too.”
taking their advice.
I, remarkably, still had both my eyes despite my impulse to hurl myself off things that were often a generous distance from the ground. Some of my other hobbies included running with sharp objects, lighting fires, and lighting sharp objects on fire and launching them
into the sky with my slingshot. So, naturally, when it was my turn in Truth or Dare, my friends never had to ask.
“Dare!” I hollered and head-butted a tree.
The other kids laughed. That was my favorite part.
“I dare you to . . .” Mike looked around the forest for something I hadn’t yet climbed, eaten, or peed on. One time, he puked after I made him eat a worm, so I ate ten worms and a beetle just to make him look like a baby in front of pretty Ruby S.
“This’d better be good,” Ruby said as she perched herself on a tree stump like it was box seats at the opera, pointing her candy heart nose at the ceiling as she admired the crown molding.
Mike thought for a moment longer, then flashed me a wily grin.
“Did you hear about the thing that ate Gretchen’s dog?”
“Again?” I scoffed. Mike’s cousin Gretchen was always making up stories. Her most recent string of lies featuring beloved family pets meeting strange and untimely demises. She was pretty weird.
“This one’s real!” Mike insisted. “Charlie got off his leash and started sniffing around this old cabin by the creek. She tried to call him back, but he wouldn’t come. Then like a minute later, she saw this half-man, half-spider thing looking back at her through the win-
dow, and she bolted.”
Ruby gasped and leaned forward on her stump. “She just left Charlie there?”
Mike nodded and continued, “She showed me the place. It’s creepy. Covered in cobwebs and stuff. I wanted to look inside, but Gretchen started crying ’cause she didn’t want me leaving her there by herself. She’s scared of spiders.”
“I think you’re the one who’s afraid of spiders,” I said, wiggling my fingers like they were eight hairy legs.
Mike didn’t take the bait. He leveled his gaze on me and said, “I dare you to touch it.”
“What? The cabin?”
Mike nodded, searching my face for signs of fear. “What d’ya say?Truth or—”
“Dare.”
“That’s it.” Mike pointed to a ramshackle cabin made of splintered, gray wood. The windows were dark and shrouded by cobwebs. It appeared no one was home.
This was going to be easy. “So, I just have to walk up and touch it?” I asked.
Mike hesitated, clearly thrown off by how unfazed I was.
“Yeah . . . but you have to keep your hand on it for at least twenty seconds.”
I almost laughed. This was weak, even for Mike.
“Guys, look,” Ruby said, pointing to a small flock of sparrows that had settled on the roof of the cabin.
“What is it?” I asked, failing to see what was so interesting about a bunch of birds.
“Just watch,” she said.
One by one, the birds beat their wings, but none of them lifted off. It was as if something was anchoring them by their tiny wishbone feet. They furiously flapped and chirped for help as their heads jump-cut from one angle to the next, searching the sky for hawks
or eagles.
“Poor birds!” Ruby cared enough to exclaim, but not enough to do something about it. She turned to me. “You have to save them.”
“Yeah, Roarke. Save them.” Mike nudged me forward.
For the first time in my life, I hesitated. I didn’t hesitate when I drove my uncle’s truck when he left it running in the driveway, or when I caught that snake and wore it like a necktie. But something about this was different. My heart fluttered; my pulse raced. I was . . .
“What’s wrong? Scared Old Man Spider’s gonna eat you?”
“No!” I sounded more defensive than I’d have liked. I could see the other kids doubting me, Ruby doubting me.
I head-butted the nearest tree, took one last look at Ruby’s candy heart nose, and ran to my almost certain doom.
I slowed to a stop within spitting distance of the cabin—twenty--three feet, my personal best. I made sure the coast was clear before I pulled myself onto the branch of a sagging elm and shimmied over to the eaves of Old Man Spider’s roof. Then I realized what was keeping the birds from leaving. Most of the cottage’s roof was missing, and in its place was what looked like a tarp made of spider’s silk.
I carefully placed my weight on one of the several rotten two-by-fours that remained of the original roof and went to work freeing the birds with my Swiss Army knife, cutting the threads that bound their tiny feet while being careful not to step on the sticky stuff myself.
I could see Ruby from where I was, so I decided to make a show of it. I leaped from board to board, bird to bird, cutting them loose and throwing my arms in the air as if I had performed some kind of magic trick.
Ruby’s lips were moving, probably saying something like, “Oh! Did you see that? Roarke is so brave.” When all the birds were free, I took a bow and wondered if I’d get a kiss later. Then came time for my final trick: the Disappearing Act. Like a trapdoor, the board beneath my feet gave way, and I fell.
I braced myself for the landing I had nailed a hundred times before from the tops of trees, roofs, and bridges, but it never came. I found myself cradled in a hammock of spider silk not three feet from the ground. I had fallen into Old Man Spider’s trap.
I struggled to break free but only succeeded in making myself more tangled. Where was my knife? Not in my pocket. I eventually spotted it suspended several feet above me from a single thread of silk. I could see the webbing had caught the blade, not the handle, so
all I could do was wait as gravity cut through the thread and hope it didn’t land on any part of me that contained a vital organ.
As my eyes adjusted to the dark, my surroundings revealed themselves. The room itself was spartan—the only pieces of furniture were a kitchen table and a sofa bed with springs sticking out of the mattress. It was what was above eye level that was cluttered. Spoons,
toothbrushes, socks, tweezers, tennis rackets, and other household miscellany hung suspended in long, sticky tendrils that dangled from large sheets of cobweb on the ceiling. It was as if all those items had gotten stuck at some point and whoever lived here just hadn’t bothered to cut them down.
I heard a shuffling noise behind me. My heart raced as I imagined a giant half-man, half-spider pinning me down with its hairy arms as it prepared to devour me headfirst. Luckily, the thing that found me was no mutant human-spider hybrid, but entirely man: two
legs, two arms, two eyes, hair mostly concentrated on his scalp. He also had two pant legs and two sleeves—both of which were soiled and frayed—and a long, salt-and-pepper beard that he most likely used as a napkin from the amount of food particles that were nestled in it. I guess he wasn’t so much old as he was dirty, although I could see how it might be hard to tell from a distance.
“What’s this?” His look of surprise suggested he had never seen a child before.
“Get away from me!” I shouted and struggled against the webbing that bound me.
“You’ll pardon my asking, but this is my house. Why do you ask that I remove myself from it when you are the one dropping in unannounced?”
“I’m not scared of you!”
The man once again looked surprised. “And why should you be?”
“Because! You . . . you’re a villain!”
“A villain?”
“You trap animals in your web and eat them!” I said bluntly.
“I think you have me confused with someone else. Have you tried Myra Oswald on South Street? She’s an odd one.”
“What about . . . kids?”
“Of course not! Eating children is a ghastly business.”
My muscles relaxed a little. “Then why do you live in this creepy place?”
“Because I needed a place to stay and it was available. The roof needed some patching-up, so my eight-legged friends offered to fix it for me. Would you like something to eat? Cheese? Watermelon?”
I liked both cheese and watermelon, and Old Man Spider didn’t seem so bad, but I wanted out of that web.
“No, thanks. Could you help cut me out? My knife got stuck.”
He gazed up at the hole in his ceiling. “What were you doing up there, anyway?”
I told him about the birds, the bet, and Mike.
“I tell them not to land on the roof, but they keep doing it. You could say they’re a little flighty.” He paused like actors do in sitcoms after they’ve told a joke, only I had no idea what the joke was.
“Never mind,” he added flatly.
“Can you get me outta here or not?”
“Of course, of course!” Old Man Spider went to work untangling my mess. “This might take a while. As you can see, when things get caught, I usually just leave them where they are.”
I glanced at a cheese grater hanging not ten inches from my face and wondered if he just stood in the middle of the living room to grate his cheese.
“What is your name, young man?”
“Roarke.”
“Roarke, Roarke . . .” The man ran off and rummaged through a kitchen drawer. He pulled out a leather-bound book and flipped through it. “Rachel, Randy, Reginald, Ronald. No Roarke. You’re the first!” He excitedly scribbled something in the book. “I try not to repeat names. You don’t know how many Johns I’ve told to skedaddle! My goal is to know one person of every name. I haven’t met another Weylyn, yet. That’s my name—Weylyn Grey,” he said,shaking my hand. His name suited him. He had gray eyes that shone
like fish scales in the light.
The web was starting to make my skin itch. “I really gotta go home.”
“Of course. My apologies.” Weylyn got back to work.
I hoped my mom had bought more chocolate milk. Maybe she’d let me have some after she made me try on that eye patch again and asked me how I’d like to have one of my own.
“So, what’s a smart boy like you doing climbing on people’s roofs? You could’ve hurt yourself.”
“I’ve done much crazier stuff than that.”
I told him some of my best stories: the one about the sewer and the train tracks and the neighbor’s dogs. Weylyn seemed unimpressed.
“What? You got something better?”
Weylyn smiled. “I was young once, too.”
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