Sharon Li: apprentice shaman and community support officer for the magically inclined. It wasn't the career Sharon had in mind, but she's getting used to running Magicals Anonymous and learning how to Be One With The City. When the Midnight Mayor goes missing, leaving only a suspiciously innocent-looking umbrella behind him, Sharon finds herself promoted. Her first task: find the Midnight Mayor. The only clues she has are a city dryad's cryptic message of doom and several pairs of abandoned shoes . . . Suddenly, Sharon's job feels a whole lot harder. Shaman Sharon Li's adventures continue among the magical beings of modern-day London in this spell-binding sequel to Stray Souls . "I'm fully convinced that Kate Griffin is a literary sorceress. She weaves the most intricate spells with clever, artful, snarky, luxurious prose, characters who are both painfully human and gloriously badass, and settings so magical you forget they're real places. When I get my hands on a new Kate Griffin book I put down everything else. She's just that good."― N.K. Jemisin "London's magic has seldom if ever been brought to life so electrifyingly and convincingly."― Mike Carey on A Madness of Angels "Griffin's lush prose and chatty dialogue...create a wonderful ambiance."― Publishers Weekly on A Madness of Angels "Griffin's novel mixes fantasy and reality into a plot that brings to mind Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere ."― RT Book Reviews on A Madness of Angels "Wonderful. This utterly charming protagonist easily elevates Griffin's second magical London series above the urban fantasy crowd."― Publisher's Weekly (starred review) "Griffin does it again: In this outstanding follow-up to the excellent Stray Souls ... the characters are so unique and enjoyable quirky."― RT Book Reviews (4 stars) "Griffin has delivered another example of urban fantasy at it's best."― Library Journal Kate Griffin is the name under which Carnegie Medal-nominated author Catherine Webb writes fantasy novels for adults. An acclaimed author of young adult books under her own name, Catherine's amazing debut, Mirror Dreams , was written when she was only fourteen years old, and garnered comparisons with Terry Pratchett and Philip Pullman. She read History at the London School of Economics, and studied at RADA. Find out more about the author at www.kategriffin.net. The Glass God By Kate Griffin Orbit Copyright © 2013 Kate Griffin All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-316-18727-5 CHAPTER 1 Listen to the Expert He said, "No, wait, you don't want to ..." But, as was so often the case, no one listened. Which was why the next thing they said was, "We told you so." Things went downhill from there. CHAPTER 2 Keep Your Feet on the Ground He feels something press against his thigh, and half turns in indignation. But the person who just brushed by is still walking calmly on, shouldershunched, head down beneath a trilby hat, and Darren, as he brushes his leg,can't feel any blood, and is already half wondering if he imagined it. Perhapshe did. He's had a bit to drink and while he's okay–of course, he'sfine!–it's easy to get jumpy on a lonely night. He walks on, past the shuttered convenience store and the locked-up laundrette,beneath the painting on the wall of the grinning monkey, banana in hand, andthrough the accusing stare of the policeman drawn on the metal grille thatguards the tattoo parlour, whose graffittoed face warns all passers-by that thisshop is his shop. He turns the corner into the terraced road where helives, six to the flat share, a house with a nice back garden where theysometimes try to have a barbecue in order to force the weather to turn to rain,walks three more paces, and pauses. Stops. Stares at nothing in particular, then down at the ground. He seems ... surprised. It appears to Darren, and indeed to anyone who might be observing Darren at thetime, that suddenly everything he's known up to this point has been meaningless.All that was has passed him by, and all that remains is everything which is, andyet to come. He is used to having such profound thoughts at two in the morningafter a night in the pub, but it seems to him that this is, perhaps, revelatory.A feeling deeper, truer and more meaningful than anything he has everexperienced with or without the aid of illegal substances, ever before. And so, for tomorrow can only come if we let go of today, he reaches down to hisshoes, and carefully slips them off his feet. His socks are stripy,multicoloured, a reminder, he always felt, that underneath his veneer of cleanwhite shirt and sensible trousers, he once fought for social freedoms andartistic expression. He flexes his toes on the ground, feeling the sudden dampchill of the paving stones rise up through the clean fabric, into the soles ofhis feet. He lifts up his shoes, carefully unpicking the knot in the laces,then, once they are free, ties the laces back together, one shoe to the other.He raises his head, looking fo