Title: The Society: Proof
Author: Aaron
Crabill
Series: The Society (#1)
Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal, Adventure
Good Reads: Add to TBR List
Purchase Links: Amazon|Paperback| Barnes and Noble| Smashwords | Books
A Million (BAM) | iBooks
Synopsis: Keely
Allison has spent years trying to prove that her home town of Pembleton Arizona
is haunted. She’s let her grades slip, upset her mother by avoiding anything
remotely close to the normal high school experience, and utterly ignored a love
life.
She’s the leader of two person paranormal society, along with her polar
opposite Tad Buckley. Tad’s an honors student, the apple of his folks’ eyes and
totally in love with Keely (he has been for years and he really, really, really
thinks this will be the year he finally tells her just that). When Sean Cage
moves to town everyone’s life gets thrown into a violent upheaval. He joins the
society, challenges their methods, becomes the first crush of Keely’s life, and
forces Tad into a put up or shut up position with his feelings for Keely.
As
the three find their paranormal and romantic lives suddenly in fast forward,
they too find the already well documented spookiness of Pembleton Arizona doing
the same. Sean finds sleep nearly impossible as he’s taunted by a monstrous
black mass at the foot of his bed. Tad is forced to choose between sneaking out
the back door like the rest of the honors kids or going out the front and
potentially facing hazing at the hands of a demon possessed jock-bully.
As for
Keely she just may find the proof she’s always wanted so badly to find, the
question is will she believe it when it’s standing right in front of her?
Excerpt : Chapter 23
The week went by pretty much like any other week for Sean and
Keely and Tad. They were anxious about
their hunt. Tad didn’t see much of the
other two as he was in his AP classes and because he and Nate hung out almost
every day after school that week, not because Tad was dodging them but because
he was enjoying spending some time with Nate.
Sean and Keely were keeping it all strictly professional and spent most
of their time together talking about the hunt they had coming up.
And while they were having a good week, things were not so good for Randy Adams. He was sleeping more than twelve hours a day. He’d had two more ugly confrontations with his father. Both of which saw his father backing down to him. Normally Randy might have enjoyed that kind of thing, but the fact that he felt totally out of control of himself while it was happening scared him.
He was hot, physically warm all the time. He sweated through his clothes at school and couldn’t seem to stop it. He thought about going to see a doctor, but was too scared to find out that there might be something wrong with him, even though he was completely convinced there already was. Randy felt it was better to just assume it might get better. So he covered his body in antiperspirant to try and keep dry, but nothing worked. His hair lay matted down on his fore head rather than the butch spike he used to keep.
He’d lose track of time once in a while, forget where he was
for a period of time, and find himself in some place completely different than
before. He was scared to the point that
he was becoming paranoid and violent.
He’d missed football practice all week.
When his coach came to talk to him he’d lifted him off the ground by the
neck with one hand and pinned him against the wall. The coach was so jealous in protecting his reputation that he
didn’t even think about turning Randy in.
He’d tried to avoid Tad, and Sean, and Keely…at least when
he knew what he was doing. He was
afraid that those three nerds would know what was wrong with him. That they would be able to look at him, and
see it, and then they’d tell him what he already knew that he was totally,
completely, incurably screwed.
On Friday morning Randy was having one of his moments. He was sitting in a desk in the back of
Tosh’s class sweating profusely. He
stayed in the back of the room with his head down. Neither Sean nor Keely had even tried speaking to him after what
happened at the house and there was no way he was speaking to them.
He felt hot and he felt his head roll back seemingly under
its own power. He found himself staring
at Keely, staring a hole right in the back of her head. He couldn’t break his stare no matter how
hard he tried. His hand was clenching a
pencil and moving on its own too. He
was drawing something maybe writing something, symbols images but not words,
not words anyone could understand at least not anyone in that class room.
He felt his eyes roll back into his head, but somehow he was
still able to see. And what he saw was Keely turning to look at him. She made an odd face, a face not so much
disgusted, as concerned.
“You ok there Randy?” she asked looking him right in the
eye.
At that moment Randy wanted to break down. He wanted to admit it. He wanted to just say, “No. I’m not OK.
Something’s wrong with me and has been since last week. I feel like there’s something inside my mind
with me and it’s screwing my whole body up, and I’m sweating all the time, and
my dad is scared of me, and I’m scared of me too. Can’t you help me? Can’t
you please help me?!?” But none of that came out of his mouth.
Something did come out of him, but it wasn’t words. It didn’t even sound like Randy. It sounded like something else
entirely. He opened his mouth and made
a loud high pitched sucking sound kind of like a yawn. Everyone in class snapped to look at
him. Tosh even rose up from her cross
legged seated position on her desk.
Then Randy started to say something in that same high
pitched inward breathing style, but it wasn’t English.
Some of the class laughed.
Most sat there extremely uncomfortable as Randy Adams sat in his desk
with his eyes rolled back into his head leaving only white where his brown
irises should have been and spoke in a horrifying tone in a language that
sounded like a record being played backward.
Randy then rose to his feet and started walking toward Keely. Even though his eyes were rolled back in his
head he still managed to make it right to her.
Randy could see Keely as clear as day despite the fact he
was actually looking at the inside of his own eye socket. He saw his hand reach out and grab her by
the wrist. He saw her expression change
from concern to annoyance, to pain. He
wasn’t doing any of this…but he was doing all of this. Tears started to pour from his white eyes.
Tosh rushed in, barking at Randy to let go. He kept hearing the strange sounds coming
from his mouth. He felt a hand on his
shoulder. He felt his body being jerked
around. He felt almost happy to see
Sean Cage throwing a punch at him. He
hoped it would snap him out of whatever was happening to him.
But that punch didn’t hit its mark. He would not let go of Keely. As Sean pulled him around he’d pulled Keely
around with him tipping her desk over and sending her to the floor. He still held tight to her wrist. Sean’s punch landed right inside the palm of
Randy’s other hand.
Randy felt his fingers clutch around Sean’s fist and
squeeze. He felt Sean’s knuckles pop as
he did so. Sean’s expression was shock,
and even though it actually passed his mind at that moment, he really should be
enjoying this, he was more scared than ever.
He saw Sean’s face violently fly toward him as he landed a head butt
right in the new guy’s grill sending the kid who’d embarrassed him so many
times down in a heap to the floor.
Tosh ran out the door and started screaming for
security. Randy felt himself turn back
to Keely who was trying at this point to bite his hand in a desperate attempt
to get him to let her go. She thrashed
and tried to kick at him but Randy couldn’t really feel any of it. He could feel his jaw moving. He could hear his words starting to make
sense.
“Do not think you can defy him,” he heard himself say. “It is my onus to protect him. I will destroy you all.”
Randy suddenly felt pain.
He hadn’t when Keely kicked and bit him, he hadn’t felt pain when his
head smashed into Sean’s, but now he did. And as he felt that pain he saw
particles of wood, and what were clearly chair legs fly past him and crash to
the floor. He spun to see Sean holding
a broken chair in his hands. The other
kids in the class had backed to the walls.
Randy felt himself laugh a laugh that was not his own. He started to move toward Sean but felt
himself pulled around. Randy was
relieved to see Tom Folks, the school’s security officer standing there. That relief faded fast as he saw the back of
his own hand smack Folks in the face and send him crashing back into Tosh’s
desk. He found himself turning back to
Sean. He had let go of Keely after the
impact of the chair. Keely had gotten
out of his immediate sphere of influence, but Sean true to form wasn’t backing
down.
Randy started to move toward him knowing that he was about
to do something horrible to Sean whether he wanted to or not, but before he was
able to do anything he felt an incredible pain like a thousand bee stings nail
him from behind. He felt the taser that
Officer Folks carried on him land right in the base of his neck and he felt big
time pain. He also felt whatever it was
that had been controlling him suddenly vanish.
He hit the floor with a wave of abatement passing through him.
Randy was so happy to be back in control of himself that he
put up no struggle at all while Folks put plastic cuffs on him and pulled him
to his feet. He was smiling and on the
verge of happy laughter as he was shoved out of the room.
Sean checked on Keely.
She told him she was fine. Tosh
said she wanted to speak to both of them after class.
Randy was told he was going to be taken to the police
station. He couldn’t care less. He couldn’t feel that thing in his mind not
even in the recesses. He was
himself. He was himself. He was so
happy to himself that he didn’t care about what was going to happen to him
next.
He looked up at himself in the rear view mirror of the
police cruiser.
He saw himself smile.
He looked at his eyes.
He saw red.
And fear filled every inch of his body.
Title: The Society:
Conspiracy
Author: Aaron
Crabill
Series: The Society (#2)
Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal, Adventure
Goodreads: Add to TBR List
Purchase Links: Amazon | Paperback| Books
A Million
Synopsis: The second incredible chapter in The Society cycle finds the
team growing. Keely, Sean, and Tad are joined by their formerly demon possessed
enemy Randy Adams. They’ve gone public with their findings and have become
celebrities in their hometown and around the world thanks to their popular
website. But this new level of attention has drawn the attention of the
mysterious and powerful group of global powers they were warned never to cross.
This deadly conspiracy of men has begun to move against them from the shadows
in ways they never could have anticipated. A new supernatural threat has arisen
with a personal vendetta against them and plans to tear them apart from the
inside. Things have never been better for the kids in the society. Things have
never been more deadly either.
Excerpt: CHAPTER 1
It was 3:00 in the morning.
The room was black but something even darker than the black night was
floating over the bed of Drew ‘Sneeze’ Steichen. A thick black smoke floated just inches over his prone skinny
body and slowly began to take a shape.
It began to take the shape of a woman with a long snake like tail.
“Ssssturgissss,” the forming phantom hissed.
Sneeze’s eyes burst open and his hand fired up like it was
shot from a gun and caught the phantom around the throat. The entity thrashed and a look of shock
exploded from its only means of expression, its bright red eyes. She should have been completely intangible
in this form.
“Dardissss,” Sneeze said smiling and hissing.
Dardis, the demonic entity floating over Sneeze, stared down
as he throttled her by the throat. She
had felt the presence of her lover Sturgis, the entity that had been living in
Sneeze for over six months, but she did not see him in the eyes or voice of
this mortal who had inexplicably made firm contact with her noncorporeal form.
“Where is Sturgis?”
She hissed as she tried feebly to get away from him.
Sneeze sat up, still holding her by the throat, and tapped
his fore head. “He’s right here,” he said smirking. “Yeah, your big bad demon
boyfriend took up a partial residence in my head the night he got his butt
kicked by Tad, Keely, and that other guy.”
“Impossible,” Dardis nearly shouted.
“It’s actually completely possible,” Sneeze said with a
cocky grin on his face, “Yeah ol' Sturgis apparently took out a bit of an
insurance clause that night and parked just a tiny bit of himself in me. At first he was messing me all up…making me
sweat…screwing up my room.” Sneeze
pointed to the image of the Jakob Pembleton statue marred into his wall.
Dardis didn’t have to look.
She’d seen it the moment she’d entered his room. “Do you know why you did that?” Dardis asked her voice near trembling.
“He hasn’t told me everything,” Sneeze said with a twinge of
anger in his voice. “Let me tell you
what I do know. I know you. I know you are Dardis and the two of you had
some kind of sick relationship. I know
he’s got a real mad on for the three kids who tore him a new one six months
ago. I know that there’s some group of
people working in the shadows and harvesting spirit energy and I know that
really makes him mad. I know you both
work for someone he calls…’HIM’…but that’s all I know about that. He’s going to tell me who him is sooner or
later.”
“You don’t seem to understand, he can’t talk to you,” Sneeze
said getting a little angry. “He
thought he’d come in here and run me right over like he did that jock idiot Randy…who
knows though, maybe at full power he could, but there’s only a scrap of him in
here and he can’t make me do crap, not anymore.”
“Watch your mouth mortal,” Dardis said with rising ire.
Sneeze put a little squeeze on her throat, “don’t you ever
threaten me. I’ve spent my life being
pushed around and bullied, but, thanks to Sturgis, that’s all over now…I’m
stronger…faster…I know things that no one else does, not even those idiots in
their stupid society…and…I can physically interact with the spectral plane like
I’m doing with your neck…right now.”
“You’re a cocky fool,” Dardis snapped.
“Yeah well you’re a stupid idiot.” Sneeze hollered back.
“Release me,” Dardis demanded.
Sneeze tilted his head and looked at her for a moment, then
did as she asked. Dardis quickly
withdrew across the room. She lowered
to the floor and as she did her long snake tail coiled under her. Her body was lean and womanly and
black. Unlike Sturgis who appeared as a
solid black mass she appeared to be a solid shape filled with swirling black
smoke.
“He wants me to tell you something,” Sneeze said sounding
annoyed.
“Tell me,” Dardis demanded.
“Don’t get pushy there toots,” Sneeze barked enjoying being
the bully. “He says you need to see the
master. You need to see…this…HIM…and
heh…heh heh heh.”
“Why are you laughing?”
Dardis snapped.
“He wants you to do him one last favor,” Sneeze said.
“Last favor?” Dardis
asked seeming to look through Sneeze with her red eyes.
“He knows he’s trapped in here, and he knows I’m in charge,”
Sneeze said full of his own power. “He
knows he’s never getting out. I turned
the tables on him. He was going to
control me, and now I’m using him.”
“Tell me,” Dardis said as threateningly as she could, “what
he asks of me.”
Sneeze took his time, “He’d like it very much if
you’d…heh…these are his words…destroy the children who caused his ruin.”
Dardis’s eyes narrowed, “I promise you lover, I will do more
than that.”
With that Dardis began to quickly dematerialize into smoke
and vanished from the room. Sneeze laid
back down in his bed as though this type of thing were just an annoying
routine. He pulled the covers up over
his face.
“Stop trying to boss me around,” he said out loud. “I told you I’m in charge here, and we don’t
need her helping us with those idiots, I’ll take care of that. We’ll get around to them when it’s
time. Now shut up and let me
sleep. And don’t even think about
trying to make me do anything. I’m not
wasting my time drawing anymore symbols or pictures you hear me? You work for me now. I’m HIM as far as you’re concerned.”
Deep inside of Sneeze Steichen’s head a monster screamed for
freedom, but no one heard him. Even his
captor had tuned him out.
I could not take a break from this series. I wanted to know what was going to happen next. Keely, Tad and Sean were characters we all could relate to. Not only were they average teenagers with teenage issues but they also had the courage to go out and play ghost busters to prove to everyone that their town was hunted.
These kids totally rocked at it.
The characters were all witty smart and funny. They were easy to connect to. You get to feel what they felt for each other and you’re reminded of your old crushes you had back in Junior high and high school. All the while your blood is pumping because the paranormal activity is kicked up a notch in this amazing story. The author completely keeps you at the edge of the seat because the plot is not as easy to figure out as you think and before I knew I was off to book two where the story gets even more interesting because now the paranormal activity is exposed. The whole town knows thanks to our courage’s group. But everyone is not happy about all this paranormal activity publicity and that is were book two picks up.
Honestly, I really didn’t think book two was going to be as good as one, I was completely wrong it was betters. There are new paranormal villains in town that wish to silence our friends. These strangers elicit more action in the story, which keeps the plot constantly changing, and your speeding through the book to uncover whether or not the kids are going to make it through the new trials that they are facing because these new characters are bigger, bolder and badder than the last.
Overall I really enjoyed these books and I am looking forward to reading more work from Mr. Crabill..
My Series Recommendation:
I rated both books 4 out of 5 Purple Rant Hearts and
would recommend this series to anyone that loves a good YA paranormal adventure
that is horrifying terrific and completely mommy proof safe for young readers.
FTC Disclaimer: I
received this book for free from the author, editor, publisher, or
promo host or book/blog tour organizer. This is my honest opinion about
this book and I did not receive any monetary compensation for writing
this review nor was I obligated to write a positive one.
Author Bio
Aaron Crabill is a talented writer and Superman fanatic. You
should see his toy collection it's ridiculous. He's got two wonderful sons and
a wife who's way out of his league and very understanding when it comes to
ridiculous toy collections. He currently lives in Kansas...and he's not too
fond of that.
Author Media Links
HAPPY RANTING AND RAVING !!!
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