REVIEW: THE MURDER FARM by Andrea Maria Schenkel

An imaginatively-managed approach to a basically straightforward plot theme is presented in such a way that neighbors, police, and reader are left pondering. Use of multiple first-person narratives by various observers fleshes out character and backgrounds.

THE MURDER FARM

REVIEW: CRATER TRUEBLOOD AND THE LUNAR RESCUE COMPANY by Homer Hickam

Review held till nearer publication date June 14

REVIEW: CRADLE TO GRAVE by Aline Templeton

CRADLE TO GRAVE is an incredible mystery plus thriller that breathes new life into the phrase "nonstop action/adventure/thrills." With a plot as tautly constructed as a boa hugging its prey, with danger literally at every turn, and characters deeply designed with many of them unacquainted with Truth, author Aline Templeton delivers breathless delight in suspense on every page.


CRADLE TO GRAVE

Review: PHYSICAL REHABILITATION OF ANIMALS by Susan E. Davis, PT

In the last two-thirds of a century medical advances have mightily extended the lives and quality of lives of humans and domestic pets. Both live longer so the need for treatments to ease health issues has become essential.

But many domestic pet owners aren't aware of all the options for treatment or are bewildered by the quantity of choices. Others, whose pets currently remain healthy, wish to act proactively to prevent troubles and injuries. An efficient reference source to meet all these varied needs is Susan E. Davis, PT, "Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation for Animals: A Guide for the Consumer." If you are a pet owner, or if you are looking to acquire a pet, this is the reference source you need. (I am an owner of multiple pets and am speaking from experience.)

Http://www.amazon.com/Physical-Therapy-Rehabilitation-Animals-professional/do/

Review: QUAGMIRE FEN by Stephen Harper

What a wonderful, delightful, magical, tale! We have here a sort of bayou-backwoods-rural fantasy, with multiverses, magical beings, and alternate dimensions! The villainous characters (Otis and Randal) qualify as some of the nastiest, meanest, wastes-of-lives I've read; but the good characters are just precious, and heartwarming. There is hope in these swamps ( and even in the city).

If you like your paranormal with a flair of Sci-Fi, and your romance with a flavor of paranormal-well,  come right over here; have I got the tale for you!










The author kindly gifted me a copy of this book in return for my unpaid and honest review.

AUTUMN IN CARTHAGE by Christopher Zenos: AUTHOR GUEST POST& Review

Guest post by author Christopher Zenos:

My best friend asked me the other day why I chose to self publish Autumn in Carthage. Isn’t self publishing for lazy and untalented hacks who haven’t had the gumption to go through the traditional process?

Here’s why: I have a fondness for artisanal wares—painstakingly handcrafted items whose flaws and blemishes only highlight the organic beauty of the whole. With this book, therefore, I wanted to have final say in every stage of the creative process. I had a lot of help: as was proper, editing and interior design were left to professionals; the cover reflects the artistic genius of Scarlett Rugers. But the vision embodied in theend product is mine alone.

There was, however, a deeper reason. Self publishing carries enormous and largely untapped potential for shining light into dark spaces. Large publishing houses tend to avoid genuinely bold, transgressive fiction—unless it comes from big name authors. In unshackling writers from corporate oversight, the self publishing revolution has allowed them to reclaim their status asnovelists. To speak truth to power, tilt against some orthodoxies, to reach beyond the boundaries of mere entertainment and dig deep into the human condition. Offend some people, perhaps. In other words, to once again be socially and politically relevant. Thus far, the potential for transgression has largely been exploited by erotica writers. Nothing wrong with that, and more power to them. Indeed, some work in that genre (especially “dark erotica”) runs astonishingly deep and true. But there is a vast range of social and political issues that could do with similar boundary-pushing.

This book, then, seeks to make a little trouble.

"Autumn in Carthage" Review:

On a review continuum commencing at "Yes, I liked the book," "Autumn in Carthage" comes in at "much loved-definitely a re-reader." Compelling, literate, enterprising my written and conceived, author Christopher Zenos is unafraid to explore new and primarily unexplored, undiscovered territory in this novel that refuses to be set aside. Mental disorders; the uglier (greed and ambition-driven, competitive) aspect of Academe, and yes, even the seemingly impossible Supernatural: you shall find it here. Engaging individualized characters, poetically descriptive settings, and always, always, that imminent sense of implacability: of the narrator/protagonist's universe, of the inexplicable lost of his boon companion, of the strange and twisty Supernatural elements poised along the backdrop like a Greek chorus waiting to emerge....

Autumn in Carthage at Amazon

DIXIE WANTS AN ALLERGY by TORI CORN

Author Links below:

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Mallory Heart Review:

What a precious and delightful story! A clever theme and an important lesson leads to a learning experience and a positive conclusion. Dixie learns she can be "exceptional" without having to suffer.

FYRELOCKE: JACK BOOMERSHINE AND THE PROPHECY UNTOLD by R. Christopher Kobb_Review

Fyrelocke: Jack Boomershine and the Prophecy Untold by R. Christopher Kobb
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Review of Fyrelocke

“Fyrelocke: Jack Boomershine and the Prophecy Untold” is a delightfully action-packed, uproarious adventure/fantasy with little or no suspension of disbelief necessary, as potential disbelief is checked at the door. Twelve-year-old inventor/electronics genius Jack and his finance-oriented best friend Chase find themselves mysteriously transported, after a series of text messages on his cell phone guide Jack to recover an amethyst geode, which is definitely a “fyrestone” and may be the inimitable “Fyrelocke.” Due to the magics surrounding this stone, Jack and Chase are transported to England, but it’s certainly not the England tourists usually view.

With smooth writing, good characterization, and a pace faster than any video game, “Fyrelocke” is sure to delight readers from middle-grade on up (even oldsters like this reviewer) and its fans will be hankering for further adventures of Jack, the boy who is nearly too smart for his own good.


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TROUBLEMAKER by Joseph Hansen (a Dave Brandstetter Mystery)_Review

Troublemaker by Joseph Hansen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Review of Troublemaker by Joseph Hansen
5 Stars

I was privileged to read some of the mysteries in this wonderful series years ago, after first publication. Recently I had been remembering them, and wishing I could find them again, so I’m very pleased to find Open Road Media giving a new opportunity for readers to enjoy the mysteries involving Dave Brandstetter, Gay insurance death claims investigator. Dave is a very solid, laid-back type of individual. We hardly ever see him rush, except when a case comes down to the wire and he is in a position to save a life. In this installment, on behalf of the company his father owns and which employs him, Medallion Insurance, he is looking into a sudden death, which may be suicide, accident, or murder. Of course the easiest answer is not always the right one, and Dave will have to go to many locales, interview a plethora of individuals, and eventually peel away many lies and secrets and deceits, intentional and unintentional, in order to discern the correct and accurate answer.

Although this series is predicated on a Gay protagonist, it is not erotica. Dave is half of a committed life partnership, although the individuals he encounters run the gamut from frequent illicit encounters, to “falling in love too easily,” to generosity and kind-heartedness, to easily hoodwinked. Just like our “real world,” it takes all kinds; thankfully our investigator has a steady mind and integrity of character.


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THEYONLY COME OUT AT NIGHT by Frankin Kearney_Review

They Only Come Out at Night by Frankin Kearney
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Character study balanced with uproarious action scenes of horror and carnage characterize this novel, set in the subways and the aboveground locales of New York City. Riding the subways has always included an expectation of crime, including mugging, robbery, and assault. But murders aren’t expected, aren’t as common belowground, as now; suddenly someone –or perhaps something—is targeting lone commuters, those who stay out too late at work or at classes, and so are alone embarking on a subway train or departing one. Next are attacks on subway employees, including a conductor. Eventually it seems no one is safe in the subway; but what could be causing the extraordinary level of violence involved, of murders seeming to require superhuman or beyond human strength and agility? The race is on for law enforcement to target the culprit or culprits, and for the reader to race to the end to find out: Who? What? How? And Why now? One woman, Melissa, lost her mother and nearly lost her father in an unprecedentedly brutal subway assault some years back. Now she fears that the Subway Slayer may also be targeting her, or possibly her boss/boyfriend, or even her father, who had survived the initial attack which killed his wife.

I rate this novel at 18+, due to extreme violence and some sensual encounters.
I reviewed a complimentary e-book copy of this novel, provided in return for my fair and impartial review.


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JO JOE by Sally Wiener Grotta_Review

Jo Joe by Sally Wiener Grotta
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Jo Joe by Sally Wiener Grotta
5 stars

Set in Black Bear, Pennsylvania, a fictional milieu created by authors Sally Wiener Grotta and Daniel Grotta, “Jo Joe” is a multilayered tale of small-community life, bigotry, entrenched religion, and one individual’s need to break free to assert her individuality, in the face of community pressure to either conform or to disappear. Judith Ormand is a Parisian-born product of a black French Jew and a Pennsylvania mountains Moravian. Raised until adolescence in Paris, after the death of her Grand-pere and the dissolution of her parents’ marriage, Judith goes to Black Bear to live with her mother’s folks. Due to her dark skin and professed Judaism, much of the community shuns her, but he is inexplicably defended by Joe, a hulking product of childhood abuse and football star—until he suddenly shuns her as well, leaving her vulnerable to attack and assault.

In her thirties when her beloved Gramma dies, Judith returns to Black Bear for the first time in many years (with the exception of her mother’s funeral earlier), to discover that the home and acreage have been bequeathed to Joe, whom her Gramma always distrusted. Determined to find an answer, the why of this sudden recent change of heart, Judith begins to turn over metaphorical rocks to peer underneath at the secrets such stones hide.

Ms. Grotta effectively portrays the mind-sets of this small Poconos Mountain community, going far beyond the expected “small town-everybody knows everybody’s secrets and business” to delineate the layers of savage racism, indifference and fear of outsiders, cruelty and sadism, the hive-consciousness of mobs, and the ways in which such negatives grind at the individual, producing not joy and light but instead bitterness, resentment, and fear. If we are shaped by our environment, such shaping becomes clear throughout the residents, and former residents, of Black Bear.


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