The derelict University of Oxford is their HQ, from whence they wage war on another set of invaders from the astral plane, disgusting, flesh-eating monsters called Emim. The real rulers of the UK are the Rephaim, sombre-gowned, divinely tall, humanoid but inhuman beings from another dimension. Soon she discovers that everything she thought she knew about her world is a monstrous lie. Instead she's shipped off to Oxford, a city abandoned and off‑limits since it was mysteriously 'destroyed by fire', around the time Scion suddenly emerged, 200 years ago. Arrested, drugged, brutalised and brainwashed, she expects nothing less than torture and public execution – the Scion regime is savage in its persecution of 'unnaturals'.

One night her luck runs out, and she's forced to use her powers to kill. Paige, whose special talent is for dream-walking in the aether, runs the gang's surveillance: thrilling but dangerous work, since she tends to stop breathing when she's out of her body. Talent-spotted as a schoolgirl by a sweet-talking procurer, groomed by one of London's most vicious mime-lords, she's one of the Seven Seals, the stars of a criminal syndicate: grifting a living in the forbidden realm of psychic powers.

Little does her nice, dull father know that his unambitious daughter has a shocking secret life. Since caffeine and alcohol are illegal mind-altering drugs, in 2059, 'flavoured oxygen' is the convivial social lubricant of choice. I n the first volume of 21-year-old Samantha Shannon's projected seven-book series, heroine Paige Mahoney is 19, lives in central London and works as an ossista in an Oxygen bar.

The bone season book 2