In which we yet again say goodbye to Samuel Johnson

Oh, John Connolly. You give my heart great joy and I am SO very glad that I decided to kick off the 20 Books of Summer with The Infernals! I loved The Gates so much that I think part of me was afraid that The Infernals wouldn't be as good. That it would be like Godfather 2. Instead, I got Empire Strikes Back ... a tale just as good, if not better, than the first part of the trilogy (you know, back when Star Wars was just a trilogy).

In fact, all of my worries were set aside as soon as I started to read the chapter titles. I got as far as the third title in the contents and knew that I was in for a good time.

 Now, readers. For those who haven't read The Gates yet (even though I told you back in January to do so ASAP), Connolly does give a little recap so you can play catch-up ... with a glorious scolding in the footnotes.

Yes. The footnotes are back in all of their glory!

And, really. If you haven't read the first just .... just go and do it already. Jiminy. How many times do you have to be told???

So we're back and so are Samuel and trusty canine companion Boswell. Nurd and Wormwood. Mrs Abernathy. A smattering of supporting characters that will make you go "Oh yeah! I remember them!" like a pair of policemen from Samuel's town who witnessed the events of The Gates, and a pair of demons from the same time who developed quite a fondness for quite an awful alcoholic beverage, Spiggit's Old Peculiar.

We also get new characters since this largely takes part in a different setting than the last, including the most hilarious quartet of dwarfs who are also big fans of Spiggit's. Well, they're fans. They're not big at all ... you know ... being dwarfs. Of course, the dwarfs aren't originally from the new primary setting of Hell but from the original setting of Earth. They're sort of innocent bystanders in the whole ordeal (which is probably one of the only times they've ever been innocent of anything).

So, we're in Hell. Mrs. Abernathy and a slew of other unsavory types are trying to find Samuel for one reason or another. It's not so bad. Well, it's pretty horrendous, but it could be worse. Remember, Samuel is a remarkably resilient kid.

First, the most amazing thing happens and regjnfk tbun4nbv4qui ekmjtekl5jgv34 melntfkj                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             q4b   !!!

Oh, come on. You didn't think I was REALLY going to tell you what happened, did you? Are you new here or something? (If you are: HI! Glad you found me! I'm really not as much of a rambling freak as I appear. I'm sometimes even worse. But I never ever EVER post spoilers if I can avoid it.)

Go read the book.

Read The Gates first if you haven't.

While you're at it you should probably pick up The Creeps as well since it's the third part of the trilogy. I'll get to it once my 20 Books of Summer are done. Or I'll scrap one of those pre-planned books and replace it. I'm wishy-washy like that.

Go on.

Go.