Today, we are ever delighted to host an exclusive excerpt from Nightshades, a new Urban Fantasy Thriller from Tor.com by Melissa F. Olson Alex McKenna is the new Special Agent in Charge of the Chicago office of the Bureau of Paranormal Investigations—the division tasked with investigating crimes involving shades. Or vampires, as they’re more widely known. Children have been going missing, and agents are routinely being slaughtered. It’s up to McKenna, and some unlikely allies, to get to the bottom of the problem, and find the kids before it’s too late. Nightshades is a new gritty urban fantasy from Melissa F. Olson. Prologue Heavenly, Illinois, 30 miles outside Chicago Wednesday night Out of the corner of his eye, Special Agent Gabriel Ruiz watched his new partner with serious trepidation. Stakeouts were never much fun, but being trapped in a hot sedan with a grown man who kept releasing little-girl sneezes was enough to make Ruiz give serious consideration to fed-on-fed violence. He and Creadin were parked on a poorly lit dirt road on the outskirts of Heavenly, IL, a useless little town with a cannery, a bar, and a pathetic pharmacy that did triple-duty as the local post office and […]