“I hope you like cheap thrills,” Ms. Book Whore says with a wink, leading you by the hand to the new releases shelf.

“What you have in mind?” you ask.

“Something HARD,” she says. “Use your INSTINCT.”

“Hmm…”

She clarifies: “Like THE HARD WAY, Lee Child’s newest Jack Reacher novel. Or KILLER INSTINCT, the new corporate thriller from Joseph Finder.”

“Oh,” you say, deflated. “I hear those titles caused a lot of stress over at the new headquarters for BOOKGASM, trying to decide which one to read first.”

“Indecisive fools,” she replies. “Good thing they didn’t have THE LOST VAN GOGH by A.J. Zerries sitting on their pile as well, or their pompous heads might have exploded.”

“THE LOST VAN GOGH? Say, is that anything like THE D–”

“Don’t even say it!” she screams, interrupting you. “No, but now that you had to bring it up, THE DA VINCI CODE ILLUSTRATED SCREENPLAY by Akiva Goldsman comes out today.”

You scoff. “Akiva Goldsman? What a hack.”

“He has an Oscar,” she counters.

“So does Mira Sorvino.”

“Point taken,” says the Book Whore. “But that was not very gentlemanly of you, unlike the devil.”

“Excuse me?” you say, taken aback.

“That’s the title of J.C. Hallman’s new nonfiction book: THE DEVIL IS A GENTLEMAN: EXPLORING AMERICA’S RELIGIOUS FRINGE,” she says. “You know, Satanists, Scientologists…”

“Po-tay-to, po-tah-to,” you say. “Those BOOKGASM guys are reading that as we speak. But I’m kinda in a sci-fi mood. Does that ELEMENTAL: THE TSUNAMI RELIEF ANTHOLOGY they reviewed come out today, by chance?”

“Indeed it does,” she says, “along with Nick Sagan’s latest futuristic thriller, EVERFREE, and also Chris Claremont’s X-MEN: THE LAST STAND novelization.”

“Yeah, I’d like to read that,” you answer, “but I’m afraid it will spoil the ending for me.”

“Spoil the ending? You mean like this?” asks the Book Whore. She balls her right hand into a fist and – snikt! – three sharp metal blades emerge from her knuckles. She plunges them deep into your chest, killing you instantly.