June 2026 Review Issue
Fantasy & Sci Fi
Mystery & Thrillers
Fated
Rebirth
Reno R.
Mist
Posh
Pangolin Publishers
979-8-9989053-7-7
$19.99
Paperback/$4.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Fated-Rebirth-Fantasy-Romance-Heretical/dp/B0GN8S1845
Book 1 of the Heretical Gods duology, Fated Rebirth, is a long read that contains possible triggers, and should best be digested slowly. That said, it will absolutely delight fantasy and romance readers interested in complex sagas that reveal many unexpected twists and thought-provoking revelations. Lest readers think the romance component will be gentle or lusty, or its female protagonist Violet Shaw tender and vulnerable, the story lets it be known from its opening prologue that Violet is a force to be reckoned with:
The hemp rope around Edward Fitzgerald’s throat was beautiful, precise, and tight enough to make him understand he was mine now as we stared at each other. He looked older than I remembered, impressively so, even while tied to a chair in the room that would become his coffin.
In this life, victim Edward has never made Violet his property, taken or twisted her. And he never kidnapped her.
Her companion in her mission is childhood friend Rowan Monroe, “a god’s sinful angel in human form.” His help is key to addressing the terrible, haunting memories of entrapment and murder which have impacted her studies at Shademore University. Rowan has faced his own monsters, and has been reborn to confront many things. Violet’s mission is one of them.
Reno R. Mist’s story of attraction, danger, violence, fate, and learning new things is presented with the lure of compelling realizations which will give book clubs much fodder for discussion:
Natural order. That had been the same justification Edward used when explaining why some people were born to serve, while others were born to be served ...My chest tightened. Choice and control. Freedom and survival. The same questions that had circled my skull since waking up in this younger body with older nightmares. . .
Mist’s proclivity for focusing on bigger-picture revelations and powerful insights about protective forces and being pawns in a “game for monsters” creates intriguing inspections readers won’t anticipate from a dark fantasy romance.
Embedded within these notes of discovery are ethical, moral, and psychological examinations that will lead readers to question approaches to life, death, and rebirth.
Murder, ruin, dangerous love, redemption, magic, and the clash between past and present lives and personas emerge to give readers a satisfying journey into a world where everything changes and nothing completely resolves.
Action is tempered with psychological clashes and reflections that are fast-paced yet should ideally be absorbed slowly for their depth and complexity. Again – this will delight readers who appreciate multiple thought-provoking moments in their stories over adventure alone.
Librarians interested in epic dark fantasy stories whose romances are edgy, characters powerfully proactive, and influences and intentions mercurial and interesting will find Fated Rebirth a thoroughly engrossing portrait of rage, redemption, and rebirth that’s steeped in questions about fate, destiny, and choice.
Its ability to inject all kinds of questions about these circumstances makes Fated Rebirth a winner, exhibiting passion and intention in unexpected ways.
Fated RebirthReturn to Index
Irkoy
Crystal
Raylene
Lyon
Atmosphere
Press
979-8901741733
$20.99
Paperback; $32.99
Hardcover;
$8.99 ebook
www.atmospherepress.com
Irkoy Crystal reveals a life transformed by a hike in the mountains when Nila Brant encounters an otherworldly stranger, Rion, and finds herself bonded (in thrall?) to the Iroky Crystal, a mysterious key to becoming an Iroky Bearer that changes her world.
As ordinary encounters move into extraordinary circumstances that propel Nila into a transformative experience, readers follow her journey into empowerment and new realizations.
The weave of fantasy, magical realism, and interplanetary encounters is delivered with romantic elements of suspense that create intrigue and attraction as Rion becomes Nila’s love and hero and the two tackle the challenges of courtship and destiny together.
Nila’s involvement with a cast of odd characters, from pilot Tirk to “cat” Liseth’s special ability to analyze, and Rona the Bearer, leads readers into a story of alliances, empowerment, and intergalactic encounters that are fueled by emotional connection and choice.
Libraries seeking sci-fi fantasies that simmer with enchanting encounters and new possibilities for connection and transformation will welcome how Irkoy Crystal takes one ordinary woman’s life and turns it on end.
Replete with odd encounters and new challenges, Irkoy Crystal is about tackling the unknown and unexpected with strength and proactive thinking. This offers insights and encouragement for women facing their own paradigm-changing encounters.
Irkoy CrystalReturn to Index
The Last
Gift-Knight
Dylan
Madeley
Independently
Published
9798245067421
$9.99 ebook /
$15
paperback
https://www.dylanmadeley.com
The Last Gift-Knight gives readers of epic fantasy an adventure packed with action surrounding ancestral legacies and grudges, two lives that view the same events from different angles, and legacies that give rise to revised perceptions of past and present.
The tale opens with Derek’s flight:
A sacred gust whipped past the horse’s mane and through Derek’s hair; it whistled past his ears. He welcomed the briskness of it against his cheeks. He let himself be so thoroughly consumed by the rush he felt, one which allowed neither time nor space to question where he must so urgently go or why. Is this how an ancestor felt in a fateful time? Could Derek let himself imagine, even for a moment, that this experience brought him closer to Lenn, someone he could never meet nor forget?
Viewpoints shift and a cast of characters emerges, from Lucen Gutmen to crown princess Chandra Kenderley, lady-in-waiting Ophelia, Lenn, and others whose special interests swirl around Derek’s purposes. Each adds observations and connections into the mix to deepen the story’s examination of shifting relationships and values:
You believed in me. Of the duties you left me with, one must be to believe in myself.
Issues of control and empowerment are also threads that connect these seemingly disparate lives:
The closer Chandra got to a once unimaginable throne, the further she felt from control.
As atrocities, dangerous decisions, and Derek’s personal challenge of becoming the personal guard of his family's greatest enemy come to light, the blend of knightly duties, royal perceptions, and plots which arise to immerse unsuspecting characters makes for a vivid saga. Adaptation, attacks, and angst give fantasy readers a rollicking knight-hopping fantasy adventure packed with mystery and intrigue.
Libraries choosing The Last Gift-Knight for these strengths will relish how it weaves fantasy, a surreal world of knights and royal relationships, suspense, and discovery into a multifaceted read hard to put down and packed with enlightening contrasts in perspective and wonder.
The Last Gift-KnightReturn to Index
Memory,
Memory, Go
Away
Christopher
W. Selna
Independently
Published
979-8993607627
$24.99
Hardcover/$13.99
Paperback/$1.99
eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Memory-Away-Christopher-William-Selna/dp/B0FXLPZYS6
Memory, Memory, Go Away is a dystopian sci-fi thriller set in a future where the United Founded States of America has long struggled with a suicide and opioid epidemic. The program “Memory, Memory, Go Away” promises to obliterate that epidemic by deleting certain memories that are obstacles to leading a good life. Sounds perfect? It isn’t.
The story opens with the reflections of a man who finds himself on the doorstep of a former love with murder in mind:
Oh, yes, there is a volcanic rage stored inside of him. He can easily explode like an atomic bomb. And this potential violence has been inside of him all his life... Now, he will unleash this rage boiling inside him without anyone to protect the unfortunate victims.
As readers absorb the disjointed thoughts of a psychotic personality’s dreams and nightmares, the heart of a program that promises to erase them cements its allure and potential even as the danger posed by its creator’s intentions emerges.
Protagonist Malcolm B. Jenners has long been fed the idealistic vision of how wonderful this program promises to be. Chapter One is a startling opening contrast to the deranged personality that introduced the story, presenting a very different family man who seemingly lives a perfect life: “...I don’t remember a time in all of my life when I wasn’t happy. Strange.”
As the first-person story unfolds, murder, adventure, confrontation, and control entwine in unusual ways to attract readers with a powerful assessment of the costs of perfection and ceding control to others.
Christopher W. Selna creates a series of characters whose lives are transformed by the promise of an easier life in a chaotic environment such as Beatrice and her children, who also are attracted to the potential happiness posed by a program of erasing the bad stuff from their lives:
There was no packing for Beatrice; the reasons were essential and obvious. She didn’t want anything from her old life to follow. She’d have gone into her new life without the clothes on her back if possible. She felt the same about her children. She wanted them naked and bare of any trace of their former life. She wanted them to forget everything. She wanted them reborn, as she had already felt.
What is the cost of rebirth, and who controls it and the world?
Selna’s venture into unknown territory and possibilities creates a powerful story of the origins of insanity and reactions to a much-changed world. Issues of empowerment and choice contrast nicely with characters whose lives are changed by new possibilities –not necessarily for the better:
David received the praise and commendation with great pain. God, did it hurt! All that only stoked the anger, which continued to fuel the madness.
The result is a gripping dystopian story of adaptation, murder, madness, and transformation that offers numerous contrasts between lives and choices changed by new opportunities that represent wolves in sheep’s clothing.
Libraries that choose Memory, Memory, Go Away for their collections will find it easy to highly recommend to fans of dystopian sci-fi who enjoy enlightening reflections about the importance of memories and self-control and the elements that make people individual and human. It also will prove a winner for those who enjoy psychological and social inspections, murder and intrigue, and the juxtaposition of high technology and authoritarian rule over its applications.
Filled with action and contrasts in changed lives, Memory, Memory, Go Away is a page-turner that’s hard to put down – or stop thinking about.
Memory, Memory, Go AwayReturn to Index
Vampire
Della Vita
A.L.
Hawke
Phantom
Heart LLC
978-1-968775-39-1
$6.99
ebook/$14.99
paperback/$29.99
hardcover/$19.99 audiobook
www.alhawke.com
Blood, lust, romance and art: these form the foundations of Vampire Della Vita, the story of Evita (“Eva”) Rogers and her passions. In Eva’s life, her need for ongoing “treatments” leads to her definition of being partially disabled:
“I love traveling more than anything in the world— except art. I love art more. I’ll do anything to meet our artists and plan our events. I love this job. You know that. Don’t let my cursed sick body ever stop me from living.”
Her involvement with David introduces questions about her many passions – including her attraction to a shadowy figure that harbors many mysteries (but then, so does she).
Readers who appreciate art will be delighted at how Eva interacts with figures in the art world with her own special insights about what constitutes art and how it should be displayed:
“I’m not an artist, Mr. Allan. I’m an art curator. When I met Herr Maestro, the famous surrealist called art a burning swan. Godot said her statues are like dead wood. I only meant art is a representation of reality. That’s all. It’s a human creation, like a reflection of our lives.”
As her passion for travel and art run headlong into David’s bad news over sculptor Godot’s cancellation and his public reclusiveness, readers are given insight into the special dilemmas of a vampire’s life:
“I’m too easily recognized. You weren’t known before your infection. When someone sees your pale features, they think you’re just extremely pale. No one can know what’s happened to me.”
“You can use makeup like I do.”
“It wouldn’t take much for it to smear. Look at your fingers after you spilled the wine.”
“Then you reapply it.”
“And then one photo online will get everybody guessing I’m a vampire.”
As the story delves into nightmares, imprisonment, smoking guns from blinding sunlight, and confrontations with vampires, readers receive a heady blend of intrigue, romance, fantasy, and art world politics. These create a compelling story hard to neatly categorize and easy to love.
Librarians seeking vampire stories that come with unexpected twists and romantic interludes will relish how original and delightfully intriguing are the characters of Vampire Della Vita, who each create a delightful probe into control, empowerment, attraction, and passion. This food for thought makes Vampire Della Vita highly recommendable to book clubs seeking vampire stories a cut above the usual predictable scenarios about survival and the costs of love.
Vampire Della VitaReturn to Index
At Leap
of Faith
Farm
Cheryl
Suzanne Heide
Anamcara
Press LLC
978-1-960462-64-0
$21.99
Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://anamcara-press.com/
At Leap of Faith Farm: A Memoir For Animal Lovers tells of author Cheryl Suzanne Heide and her partner’s decision to leave the comfort of jobs in Twin Cities Minnesota to say yes to a rural farm opportunity in southern Minnesota.
From the start, their decision involves turbulence, but promises future peace:
My future husband and I struggled back from the rim of a chasm that threatened to swallow us. Now with hours of counseling behind us we took precarious steps toward not only a continued future together but also a new lifestyle in a new location. It did not go smoothly. It was a turbulent series of months with no future job for my husband and no permanent home. Almost every weekend we made the two-hour trip south to search for my lifelong dream—a farm where I could keep my horses.
The farm introduces many new challenges and experiences to their lives, from horse management to issues surrounding trapping woodchucks, acquiring numerous cats, handling the acquisition and loss of horses, and better understanding the personalities, needs, and realities of rural living and farm creatures big and small.
Heide creates a loving observation of her vastly changed world and the impact it has on human and animal participants and residents alike, crafting stories which will appeal to anyone interested in making the leap from urban to farm life.
As life introduces possible disability and health issues, Heide weaves accounts of her own adjustments with those of the farm she manages:
My physical recovery was very hard, but harder still was acceptance that something that was so much a part of my life might change forever.
At Leap of Faith Farm is a rural memoir that librarians will find a winning collection addition, with its close inspection of animal personalities and farm experiences. The uplifting, celebratory atmosphere Heide creates surrounding her choices will delight readers either contemplating such a life from urban armchairs or considering making such a leap themselves.
At Leap of Faith FarmReturn to Index
Don’t
Tell
Told by
Troy Eklund,
Written by Teresa
Schapansky
TNT Book
Publishing
978-1-988024-53-0
$9.99
eBook
Website:
www.teresaschapansky.com
Ordering:
https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Tell-Teresa-Schapansky-ebook/dp/B0GQNBKQWW
The events narrated in Troy Eklund’s story Don’t Tell were never meant to see the light of day – not if the engrained childhood admonition to never speak of these events was followed.
Thankfully, as an adult, Troy Eklund disregarded this mandate in favor of the healing that comes from exposure and truth, and so Don’t Tell survived to see the light of day and provide hard-hitting revelations about family secrets, abuse, and survival tactics. Unfortunately, Eklund did not survive his struggles, and so this book is a posthumous creation based on Teresa Schapansky’s interviews.
By now, readers should have absorbed that Don’t Tell holds many trigger warnings and comes with a caution that the story won’t be uplifting or easy. It will be worth the read, for those interested in emotionally charged accounts of achieving recovery, becoming invincible by truth-telling, and firmly grasping second chances in life.
One of Eklund’s purposes in crafting this narrative is to expose a toxic mother who, on the face of things, seemed the best mother in the world. Another is to chronicle how a child can survive living long-term in the eye of a storm of abuse at home, and how addiction in his home is delivered with a mandate to never reveal the truth about what was taking place.
Perspectives shift in this story, reaching out to embrace the observations of friends and others privy to parts of Eklund’s story, such as babysitter Colleen Olson. The incorporation of these disparate viewpoints strengthens the story and outlines events from different vantage points to lend further insights into how addiction, abuse, and family secrets evolve.
Few other memoirs offer the immediacy and family insights of Don’t Tell. The spotlight may be on Teri Eklund’s choices and abusive ways, but it also lands on the impact of this childhood on adult Troy, who battles his own demons as a result of an ongoing lack of emotional support:
Mom, in her unique, loving way wasn’t pleased that I’d stuck to my guns and had proven both her and Bill wrong. She spoke not a word of praise and her facial expressions made it clear that she was less than thrilled that I was earning a decent living and enjoying a good, clean life.
In particular, the legacy of the mandate “don’t tell” comes to roost in unexpected ways as the child grows into a man and the mother/son relationship shifts:
By the fifth grade, I had begun to see mom in a different way, and it felt as though a dynamic relationship shift had occurred between us overnight. For every inch I’d grown taller and broader, she’d decreased in size proportionately before my very eyes. There were multiple times, when I’d caught her stealing looks in my direction with a hint of fear in her expression. I knew without a doubt and with every inch of my being, that this stemmed from every single incident in my life, when she had ordered, “don’t tell.”
The result is a powerful chronicle of parenting, family ties and secrets, addiction and crime, and recovery and love that will draw and immerse readers in many ways.
Libraries and readers seeking hard-hitting, emotionally impactful memoirs that come not just from a son’s experiences but the insights of everyone around him, from ex-husbands to babysitters and family friends, will find Don’t Tell a powerful force. It deserves consideration for book clubs, emotional support groups, family counseling circles, and anyone interested in the road to personal liberation from past experiences.
Don’t TellReturn to Index
Guerrilla
Dancer
Joan
Stone
Anamcara
Press LLC
978-1960462817
$31.99
Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://anamcara-press.com/
Guerrilla Dancer: Memoir of a Revolution blends dance with political inspection in a memoir of the 1960s and ‘70s, examining Joan Stone’s growing political awareness, which seeped into her passion for dancing.
Readers might think these two subjects unlikely for commingling, but Stone draws important connections between art and social movements from the start:
“The movement-happenings of the moment were being shaped into dances, as the gestures of the court had been shaped into ballet dances, the rhythms of the countryside into folk dances, and the patterns of earth and sky into tribal dances.”
The memoir first tracks Stone’s entry and evolution in the dance world, citing influences such as Yale and her attendance at the American Dance Festival in 1959, where she studied under such notable names as Merce Cunningham and Daniel Nagrin.
The foundations of her involvement in dance and choreography evolve simultaneous to her development of a “deep social consciousness” which stems as far back as World War II and McCarthyism, but includes such surprising influences as a reform temple rabbi.
When Stone moves away from dance in later years, it’s that political consciousness which leads her back and prompts her to keep a journal during the 1960s which chronicles her insights.
Readers interested in memoirs of the 1960s and its political and social turbulence will be fascinated with an account of how the arts weaves into these bigger pictures to create insights into the impact of performance in movements supporting change.
Of special note are descriptions outlining unusual connections and challenges of incorporating new political and social realizations and norms into dance’s interpretation and creation:
“Even for a choreographer, who was not upset and confused, the gender issue would have been too complex to handle in a study, but I felt compelled to try and speak. Where to turn for a vocabulary? During the personal confessions at the women’s meetings, there were gestures in words and motions that could be interpreted as
crouching, unable to stand— pouncing and clawing in all directions— flying high—
hiding the body, flaunting the body—...”
Exquisite are the moment-by-moment dance descriptions that lead readers – even non-dancers – to better understand the interpretive effort involved in creating a political dance packed with emotional and physical messages:
“No matter which prison Rosa was in, she was locked up for the night and sometimes for the day as well.
On the toes to defy gravity and backward to feel rather than see, pace off four steps, turn ninety degrees, then eight steps and another turn. Step sideways—crossing and opening the feet—with stamps at the corners. In a few letters, she describes herself as reacting “like a beast in a cage.” Walk forward, thrusting the crossed hands forward on the fourth and eighth steps. Continue the rounds with low kicks of anger and frustration, lunges, crawls, and finally just ticks of the head to indicate the dimensions of the cell. Finish in a heap. Rosa didn’t allow herself to stay down long. Use the crossed hands to rise from the ground. Lift them high, glaring at them, and let them drop.”
Libraries interested in multifaceted memoirs that will appeal to readers studying the 1960s and ‘70s, dance and the arts, political and social representations, or performance creation will find Guerrilla Dancer: Memoir of a Revolution a powerful representation of dance and social change that considers how revolutionary thinking is imparted through the arts.
Dance isn’t politics. But “it can make people think about politics in new ways.” So can this memoir, which should be a ‘must’ acquisition for libraries and readers interested in powerful connections:
“The group was dancing for civil rights activists, who can’t be content to titillate an audience with new gimmicks. They know the message as well as the medium has to be changed, and they’re being jailed and killed for trying!”
Guerrilla DancerReturn to Index
Reclamation:
An
Asexual &
Aromantic Journey to Wholeness
Cindy
Mundahl
979-8-234-03874-6
$18.00
paperback;
$7.99 ebook
Website:
www.arisingfromwithin.com
Ordering:
https://bookshop.org
Reclamation: An Asexual & Aromantic Journey to Wholeness is a memoir that surveys the cultural norms surrounding sexuality and categorization, using author Cindy Mundahl’s life and experiences to question the assumptions about gender and sexuality which dictate the course of human interactions and lives.
The journey opens with Mundahl’s reflection: “How could I live nearly fifty years without knowing who I truly am at my core?”
This mirrors decades of a search for answers that probes the foundations of self in a series of candid revelations that come from as ordinary a routine as looking in the mirror deeply for answers both simple and complex.
As she moves through life, death, trauma and her tendency to hide from herself as much as the world, Mundahl reflects on the costs and methods of these choices:
Joyce said, “You seem depressed. Are you happy here? Do you still want to be here?”
The word “no” arose from the depths of me and floated out of my mouth with no conscious effort on my part to give it life. Joyce’s question gave me an out from what I had begun to believe was a failed experiment of living on my own in a city far from home. I was already spinning a story for my friends and family about my job not working out. I could go back home as if nothing had happened and start a new life. I was the person who bought this story the most. There was no trauma I was running from. I had already told myself it didn’t happen. I had no awareness that I was depressed, but I did know I wanted to flee myself, especially my body, and the feeling that was taking root in me of not feeling alive.
Readers that move through Mundahl’s reflections and self-analysis receive many opportunities to better understand their own choices, reactions, and hidden agendas as they absorb her nuances of denial, reflection, self-analysis and revelation. These emerge from many seemingly ordinary but unexpected life encounters.
Readers read about tears, pain, trauma, recovery, a grandmother’s devastating secret, and more. Most of all, they will benefit from the peace-finding mission Mundahl embarks upon which calls into question all manner of expectations, choices, family experiences, and social connections.
Librarians interested in memoirs that probe the delicate balance between grief and recovery, discovery, and the hard work of both hiding and evolving will find Reclamation: An Asexual & Aromantic Journey to Wholeness a powerful survey of not just one life, but outside and internal definitions of emotions, health, and self-realization.
Especially highly recommended for reading groups strong in self-help, psychological introspection, and memoirs that contain journeys into new choices, Reclamation: An Asexual & Aromantic Journey to Wholeness is a journey replete with startling breakthroughs that redefine the author’s past, present and future:
Caught between straightness and gayness made my sexuality seem oversized, as if I were wearing a flashing neon sign that was so large it could be seen from space ... My sexuality pushed all my other identities out of me as it tried to integrate this new part of me that required my entire body to hold it.
Reclamation: An Asexual & Aromantic Journey to WholenessReturn to Index
Stride
Avra Wing
GFB
978-1-967510-60-3
$18.95
paperback /
$9.99 eBook
https://avrawing.com/
Stride: How I Walked Away from Trauma Toward Healing details a life transformed when a car jumped the curb and took mother Avra Wing’s leg in 1990, creating disability and prompting Wing to tap empowering sources and messages from childhood onward. These come from her feisty grandmother and a newfound friendship circle that contributes to adaptation and change.
Stride is different from other accounts of sudden disability and adaptation, in that it merges lessons from past and present with an examination of the sea change in public and personal attitude towards disability that accompanies the experience.
From Avra’s successful effort to save her three-year-old from the car that took her leg to the perceptions of others about her loss, many thought-provoking scenarios emerge that are thoroughly revealing and often shocking:
“Now her husband will divorce her.”
It’s what I overheard someone say who didn’t know me and Mike well.
The person who jumped to that conclusion was a woman, and her assumption reflected how badly she felt about herself and about being female. She reasoned that I had been disfigured, so I no longer was acceptable as a woman and a wife. That I had no or very little intrinsic value, and that my husband would naturally want to discard me and replace me with a substitute in factory-fresh condition.
Equally candid are the self-assessments of her psyche before and after the accident, which embraces a sense of how the accident changed not only her life, but the perceptions of those around her:
Not having a strong sense of who I am, and always doubting myself, it is hard for me to believe that other people see me as an actual, individual person and, somehow, even a likeable one. When I look back on it now, I wish I could have appreciated more the message Kate was giving me. Even when I was at my worst, when I felt awful about myself, a lovely woman enjoyed my company, wanted to be friends, and was not put off by my missing leg.
The whole, in this case, is greater than the parts. This memoir is about more than adaptation - it’s about understanding how the loss of a limb or a sense becomes part of the process of regaining one’s stride with new realizations about self, friendships, life connections, and purpose.
In this, Stride is a standout, offering much food for thought and many discussion points for not just the disability community, but those facing new challenges in life.
This is why librarians will want to highly recommend Stride to a wide audience beyond the usual memoir or disability reader. Wing’s story is ultimately about embracing life to its fullest, identifying and pursuing one’s passions, and making the most of achievements and goals while coping with sorrow to ultimately emerge stronger - and perhaps wiser.
Everyone needs these messages in modern times.
StrideReturn to Index
Bonds
H.N.
Hirsch
Pisgah
Press
978-1968218003
$22.95
https://www.amazon.com/Bonds-Marcus-Mystery-H-Hirsch/dp/1968218009
Bonds returns the investigative couple Bob Abramson and his partner, Prof. Marcus George, to a new mystery – this one opening with Bob’s new job as the chief Assistant DA to a new DA, which leads him to close his private practice.
Adopted daughter Lily is leaving for college, so many things are changing for the family, as well as in professional circles. As if these changes weren’t complicate enough, Bob is called upon to assist in a helping a friend fight a questionable murder charge – brought by the incoming new DA he’ll be working for when his practice finally closes.
As Bob pursues Nick’s instability and disappearance and the forces at work to undermine Jason’s life, he draws more and more dangerous connections that threaten to compromise his own future.
Though familiarity with H.N. Hirsch’s prior books will enhance appreciation for how he continues to flesh out his characters and their relationships in Bonds, newcomers will find it easy to delve into Bob’s world and its motivating forces for both justice and change:
“You’re just being paranoid,” he said to himself, out loud. But he couldn’t help himself. It was both a strength and weakness for a good lawyer—always thinking things through to any possible endgame.
Stick to the facts, like his father always said. But how can you stick to the facts and think things through at the same time?
That always bothered him, the contradiction.
Lily also participates in considerations of possibilities as various influences emerge, from issues of physician immunity to the truth about Nick’s fate. Hirsch builds fine tension as realities spin out of control and possibilities keep growing that test the moral mettle of all involved:
In various other cases, he has come across moments like this—bad news that turning out to be good news... Bob’s gut told him this was one of those times.
From disturbing thoughts about partner Anna’s possible homophobia despite the fact that they are good friends and nearly family to stereotypes about Latinos and community influences, the story weaves additional facets of moral and social integrity into the bigger murder picture.
The result is a powerfully-developed new Bob and Marcus tale of intrigue that libraries and readers will find attractive for its social reflections as well as its underlying whodunit.
Packed with twists and turns, Bonds is an exciting foray into life possibilities that uses a mystery component to promote social inspection.
BondsReturn to Index
The
Capitol Showdown
Jay Perin
East
River Books
9798988264842
$4.80 eBook
www.eastriverbooks.com
The 7th book and grand finale of the One Hundred Years of War series deserves and will attract attention from prior fans of this historical thriller series, who will find the culmination of struggles between former American president Temple and the Kingsley, Sheppard, and Barron families reaches a crescendo prior fans won’t see coming.
A sniper has ended child Mike’s life, leaving father Alex bereft and Temple certain he knows who the killer is – even if he still can’t articulate much due to his brain injury.
It doesn’t help that a room full of men well know the perp and have the firepower to take him out, because “...if any of us goes anywhere near Drummond, they’ll kill us and claim self-defense.”
This is just the opening salvo to a political thriller that traverses international ground from the U.S. to Argentina, Spain, and the challenges and drives stemming from family love as well as political ties.
Readers won’t expect the philosophical and ethical considerations that weave into this saga, but they are delightful adjuncts to the action and dilemmas that face the wide cast of characters:
“Attachment can also be to your own pride or identity,” Harry went on, “chaining you to expectations of self rather than freeing you to act selflessly. Then, you’d be right. There would be nothing meaningful you could do going forward. True courage, however, comes from selfless love for family and nation and humanity. It will guide you through this terrible unfairness. You’ll find there’s more to you than your size and your capacity to carry someone out of a burning building... new ways to give and to appreciate life.”
As a war is on the cusp of being won, individuals involved in it find their personal lives and relationships marked with a conflict that has built up in prior books, but which many still won’t see coming.
These create delightful interplays between objectives, methods of reaching goals, and the dire consequences of making mistakes to engage readers with a story of murder, empowerment, political decision-making and subterfuge, and a corporate war that places presidents and politicians in impossible situations.
While newcomers could appreciate the drama and relationships that evolve here, it’s the prior fan who has dedicated hours to absorbing the complex relationships and choices of the families and characters who will best appreciate the dovetailing and culmination of struggles created in prior books.
Replete with action, unexpected revelations and realizations, family and political quandaries and ties, and the unexpected collapse of towers and men, The Capitol Showdown is rich in action and surprises. These make for a top recommendation to libraries and readers seeking a powerful story that rests upon and adapts the classic Mahabharata, an Indian epic myth.
Its depth and insights about grappling with and rewriting history are eye-opening, compelling, and neatly sum up the prior books with a concluding volume packed with discovery.
The Capitol ShowdownReturn to Index
Dead
Exit
Michael
Balter
Mission
Point Press
978-1-968761-46-2
$17.99
Softcover/$29.95 Hardcover
www.mbalter.com
In Dead Exit, the third Marty Schott and Bo Bishop thriller adventure story, the dynamic investigative duo confronts a brother-in-law’s murder which arrives on the heels of the deadly partnership they’d become entangled in previously.
It’s not unusual to find the investigative leaders of a story fall under suspicion of wrongdoing themselves – but what is revealing is how Marty and Bo find old adversaries rise to confront and question them once again, while old threats from within their own organization add angst and danger to their investigations.
As their foundations shake in many ways, Marty and Bo confront cops, perps, state-sponsored syndicates, and their own proclivity to skirt the edges of danger and disaster.
The story embraces Marty’s point of view, which adds interesting perspectives and experience to the evolving dilemmas. Caught between a criminal underworld and their own special interests, Marty and Bo face a series of confusing networks, international forces, and a probe that moves from personal to professional challenges.
Michael Balter leads his readers through a series of confrontations and realizations that edge ever closer to complete disaster as Marty and Bo pursue a killer poised to strike again, even closer to home.
Marty’s observations and involvements add complexity and delightful personal attraction to the story as unexpected twists embrace readers in a story of international intrigue and personal challenge.
Readers will also appreciate the explicit, bold descriptions which paint powerful portraits of the emotional costs of these involvements:
All the bones in my face began to throb in sympathy with my cheekbone. Even my scalp screamed in agony.
Librarians seeking a thriller that stands nicely alone but also dovetails neatly with the personalities and motivations Marty and Bo exhibited in prior adventures will welcome the opportunity to recommend Dead Exit to a wide audience of prior fans and newcomers to their adventures.
Packed with action, Dead Exit unfolds as a sweeping saga of smuggling, corruption, and intrigue inspired by a real-world FBI sting operation. It's a story of friendship, love, and destruction–and a "dead exit" that refuses to stay dead.
Dead ExitReturn to Index
God’s Eye
Robert
Rapoza
Vinci
Books
ASIN:
B0GTTSD1GX .99 eBook
http://www.robertrapoza.com
God’s Eye is the first book in the new Jake Stone thriller series, blending political quandries with rogue forces intent upon destroying American democracy.
At the other end of the spectrum is ex-Marine CIA operative Jake Stone, tasked with employing his covert team Nemesis to participate in a hidden war which turns out to harbor an enemy not from outside the U.S., but within.
The saga opens with a vice presidential campaign overseen by presidential hopeful Thomas Owens, who is mentoring running mate Gene Romano when the unthinkable happens and Gene is assassinated at a rally.
This is just the opening salvo in a series of deadly confrontations that evolve varying points of view, giving readers delightful insights into the mindsets of operatives, perps, and collaborators such as Brian Fields, assigned to leak selected information to the press; team member Bear, who towers over his associates in more ways than one; and CEO Lauren Newsom of Athena Technologies.
Each holds a stake in outcomes, attempts to manipulate situations in various ways, and poses a different kind of threat as Jake Stone and his team race against time to uncover intentions and future threats, only to discover deeper and deeper roots to new plots.
Libraries interested in political thrillers that sizzle with suspense and shifting possibilities in power grabs and control will relish how deeply God’s Eye delves into a conspiracy surrounding national security and special interests.
From the new God’s Eye surveillance system and its ultimate controllers to DOJ and other department interactions and manipulation, fast-paced action and many surprises will keep readers thoroughly engaged and guessing about outcomes and hidden connections to the end.
God’s EyeReturn to Index
The
Guardian Angel: The Recruit
Miriam
Ferraresi
Atmosphere
Press
979-8901740460
$21.99
Paperback; $33.99 Hardcover;
$8.99 ebook
www.atmospherepress.com
The Guardian Angel: The Recruit tells of Columbian cartel second manager Jay, whose life has changed virtually overnight. As the story opens, he’s just been rescued by Columbian cartel boss Tony, and is in poor condition.
Fast forward to a few days earlier, when his job for Diego, boss of the Venezuelan cartel, seemed predictable and secure. After only a few events, his world and relationships are shattered.
As the recruit builds new relationships, a new life, and a possible romance with Sinaloa Cartel boss Rita, he comes to find the complications and potential of love in new ways as strife and struggle emerge between the cartels and matters of the heart.
Readers seeking an international thriller replete with fast-paced action, shifting alliances and deliveries gone awry will find the interconnected lives of these cartel managers, overseers, and participants to be engrossing and nicely detailed.
The rich psychology of their interactions, social and political encounters, and struggles come to life in a series of dramatic events which embrace shootings and murder attempts, safe houses, angry relatives who have lost everything, and strategies gone awry as a host of interests collide.
Miriam Ferraresi brings to life the world of cartels and conflicts, drawing connections between a broad circle of interrelated activities and interests to keep readers guessing about outcomes and alliances.
Libraries seeking gripping, action-packed thrillers about South American cartels, family ties, and a touch of romance which changes everything will find it easy to highly recommend The Guardian Angel: The Recruit. It will attract readers who like their action tempered by close psychological inspection and interconnected relationship quandaries.
Rich in contrasts between Los Angeles culture and South American special interests, The Guardian Angel: The Recruit is a thriller marked by its consideration of different forms of closeness and connection – and what happens when these associations shift or fail.
The Guardian Angel: The RecruitReturn to Index
The
Journey Home
Diane
Hatz
Whole
Healthy Group LLC
979-8-9908498-2-2
$15.99
www.dianehatz.com
The Journey Home, the fourth book in the Mind Monster series, again follows Alex’s confrontation with dark forces and tyrannical billionaires, opening with the same powerful descriptive force as the previous books:
Alex bolted toward the hallway, her improbable blonde hair streaked dark green disgust and anger black. She raced past her assistant, Dawn, waiting in the outer reception suite.
Newcomers and prior fans of Alex will be drawn to find the source of her latest angst and will easily absorb the return of mind messenger monster “Spike,” whose admonitions direct her life and forge new pathways with the Spiritual Enterprise Network (a covert group that thwarts unknown threats most of the world doesn’t know about).
From violating assaults by boss JT Wilson, who reconnects her with men she’d loved in the past, to the efforts of former colleague Hellie to help her, Alex encounters the rich, the deadly, and the dangerous with a strength backed by forces within and outside of her mind.
Prior readers have an edge on absorbing all these characters and influences from previous escapades, making The Journey Home especially recommendable to previous fans who will find this latest adventure easy to enter.
Newcomers have plenty to absorb, between paranormal encounters, underlying messages about courage and ongoing healing processes, the impact of vanity and wealth on society, and even kidnappings and robot bodies.
All these facets meld in a work of visionary fiction that is cemented by a proactive, creative main character whose likeable force drives a blend of psychological thriller and paranormal suspense.
Libraries seeking genre-bending stories that can be highly recommended to a wide audience of thriller readers, fans of paranormal fiction, and those who love mystery and suspense packed with unexpected twists and turns will find The Journey Home just the ticket. Its top-notch quasi-fantasy offers important insights on self-empowerment, self-love, and friendships.
The Journey HomeReturn to Index
One of
Us Must Die
Zelly
Ruskin
She
Writes Press
979-8896361800
$17.99 Paperback/$12.99
eBook
https://www.amazon.com/One-Us-Must-Die-Novel/dp/B0GPDHHBPQ
How far would you go to escape an unhappy marriage, especially if children and inheritance are involved?
In One of Us Must Die, Sterling faces impossible choices when she finally admits the charade of her perfect marriage is being threatened by her increasingly reckless husband’s dangerous actions. The final straw comes when she observes his effect on their children’s choices as they learn from him and threaten to forge their own dysfunctional relationships in life. What’s a woman to do?
It all boils down to legal and social entanglements which seem to point to only one resolution – one of them must die.
Zelly Ruskin takes this concept to the limits as Sterling confronts the truth of the extent of Keith’s repression of her, deciding on a course of action which both places her in the crosshairs of illegality and promises a form of freedom that can save her.
Medicated illusion of calm aside, Sterling adopts a sly, purposeful plan even as her daughter contemplates a marriage which will follow in her mother’s footsteps:
Had she been confident enough to trust her instincts and say no, she wouldn’t have been the mother of the enchanting bride before her.
From Keith’s subterfuge to the paths Sterling considers that will lead to either freedom or jail, readers receive a powerful story that moves between a thought-provoking novel of a woman entrapped in her own dream of a perfect life and a thriller about what she will choose and what lengths she will go to pursue something different.
The tension is finely tuned, dilemmas realistic and thought-provoking, and the action wonderfully wound into evolving family relationships and impact as the saga unfolds.
Librarians seeking a novel which incorporates suspense elements and social examination alike will appreciate how One of Us Must Die unfolds a powerfully evocative tale of psychological dilemmas, problem-solving, and resolution.
Filled with unexpected insights and twists, One of Us Must Die is hard to put down, and will give women much food for thought about marriage, family, repression, gaslighting, and survival.
One of Us Must DieReturn to Index
Quant
Anthony
Bidulka
Bon
Vivant Books
978-1-990495-12-0
Paperback:
$16.99/eBook: $8.99
Website:
www.anthonybidulka.com
P.I. Russell Quant returns in his ninth investigation in Quant, the further exploits of the Canadian, gay, world-hopping former farmboy/ex police officer.
Over twenty years since the first Quant mystery and fifteen years since the last seeming-concluding volume, thankfully Anthony Bidulka returns Quant to newcomers and prior fans who felt that Book 8 didn’t finish matters.
Here, fifty-four-year-old Quant opens with a dreaded day arrived at last – the walk-through of his mother’s farmhouse, with all its memories and clutter, before his mother moves on.
There’s more to the story than laying old memories to rest, however, for Quant’s ongoing ability to question himself, his motivations, and his actions drove his prior adventures and continues to provide satisfyingly realistic adjuncts to the mystery that evolves in this story:
Was this internalized homophobia? Had I automatically downgraded my ability and appeal as a provider and companion for my mother just because I’m gay? Well, screw that.
In the midst of his emotional reflections, mentor, friend, and quasi-father figure Anthony Gatt brings Quant a new problem concerning his mother, Kay, who seeks to sell off art to pay a P.I. - who is not Quant.
Saskatchewan continues to be a powerful backdrop to events that swirl around Quant’s family, the Beautiful Prairie Rainbow Retirement Inn, criminal behaviour that permeates even the small village of Howell, and matters of rich and powerful entrepreneurs such as Phillip Painchaud.
As Quant delves ever deeper into a rabbit’s warren of interconnected purposes, special interests, and evolving threats, his personal and professional lives become ever more entwined in a captivating story that further develops Quant’s relationships, motivations, and talents.
Prior fans will relish these expanded visions of his work and perspectives while newcomers dropped into the 9th book won’t be lost – references to past relationships, events, and challenges keep all of Quant’s decisions and experiences logical and easily understood.
Especially poignant are challenges of aging and caring for a declining mother:
At the core of all my recent sadness and grief and dissatisfaction with life was the fact that Mom’s disease was slowly but surely taking her away from me. Every day I watched helplessly as she moved further away from me, from fully being with me, from knowing me.
Librarians should know that acquiring Quant doesn’t mean the prior eight books are a prerequisite. They also should know, however, that newcomers that delve into Quant will likely turn to the others for more delightful adventure and insights.
Replete with mystery combined with the anguish of growing old and the decisions revolving around shifting family connections, Quant is a winner.
QuantReturn to Index
A
Symphony of Spies
Thomas
R. Boniello
Olympia
Publishers
978-1-83543-522-9
$20.99
Paperback/$6.67 eBook
www.olympiapublishers.com
A Symphony of Spies is a compelling thriller that revolves around physicist Drew Reid’s decision to confide in his roommates about classified research he’s conducting – a decision that places everyone in the crosshairs of a CIA analyst and charges of espionage.
The story opens with Russian hockey player Pietro “Ollie” Olyokintov’s involvement in the Russian Junior Hockey League and fellow athlete Kostin Alendreypov’s arrest for espionage.
Chapter 2 introduces CIA agent Elizabeth Orr’s mandate to monitor the movements of international money in and out of Russia. Her side hobby of experimenting with surveillance codes leads to a revelation about tracking laundered money in a new way:
Beth could see it: a pathway leaning on statistical probabilities developed out of the international banking system to identify illicit monies leaving Russia that would not require the yeoman-like development of a centralized database. Why hasn’t anyone thought of this?
Her epiphany sends her in a different direction and introduces other characters who add insights not just about Russian assets, espionage, and research, but the psyches and lives of ordinary Russians:
“In Russia, impoverished people often have little except friendships and emotional integrity. Sometimes, it is all they have.”
Freshman cellist Nash, principal cellist Slava Svyetnakov (whose agenda includes more than musical ambition “Svyetnakov’s family is part of the new Russian autocracy. He is likely here to plunder American women, drink American beer, and steal nuclear secrets for Mother Russia.”), and the special language of instrument currency entwine in a plot steeped in music, intrigue, insurance and financial entanglements, and CIA, FBI, and researcher special interests.
As the search for traitors reveals underlying connections and threats, other characters such as Dr. Wilderotter, the Deputy Director of the Clandestine Service, and the circumstances surrounding Slava Svyetnakov’s connections to music and possible mayhem evolve intriguing blends of international espionage and national security questions.
Thomas R. Boniello weaves music, Russian interests, financial and political entanglements, and investigative pathways in a manner that will delight thriller readers seeking a multifaceted story enriched by the dilemma of a physicist’s work and choices.
Libraries seeking suspense stories that move between special interests and dangerous associations will find A Symphony of Spies especially compelling for its dovetailing of more than one kind of spy, snafu, and definition of loyalty.
Its many twists and injection of musical interludes make A Symphony of Spies an unusual, involving tale of assets, survival tactics, and revelations that’s hard to put down.
A Symphony of SpiesReturn to Index
Under
the Tree Ferns
Kathryn
L. Robinson
She
Writes Press
979-8-89636-332-3
$17.99
Paperback/$12.99 eBook
Website:
https://www.kathrynlrobinson.com/
Ordering:
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Under-the-Tree-Ferns/Kathryn-L-Robinson/9798896363323
Under the Tree Ferns is an intriguing mystery set in Puerto Rico and Idaho. It moves between different milieus, a dead body, and two disparate investigators with the dexterity of a dancer, opening in a steamy mountain rainforest where a woman struggles to understand what has happened to her.
The prologue leads to a mystery which unfolds in 1942 Puerto Rico with the discovery of a corpse in the jungle. The forest is rumored to be haunted, so those tasked with locating and retrieving the body are terrified - except for police chief Moreno.
What does this event have to do with 2012 Idaho, which pops up in the third chapter? Plenty, because a family secret that played out in the jungles of Puerto Rico reaches out to involve a modern family. Pamela Palmer gets a job on the island, only to discover that her new venture immerses her in revelations about the past that could endanger her future.
Kathryn L. Robinson’s story moves back and forth in time and place, but keeps these shifts logical and easy to understand as Pamela reflects on the events that brought her to Puerto Rico, and then led her to abandon a sunny island climate for the faraway chill of Idaho.
She takes the time to embed the story with a solid sense of place, capturing Puerto Rico’s culture and changes through succinct descriptions:
Below, the marketplace sprawled across a courtyard the size of a city block. Of the dozens of stands, each little more than one long table and a chair, fewer than half were in use, displaying dwindling piles of tropical fruits and vegetables—green limes, yellow bananas, variegated mangoes and squash. Shoppers wandered from stand to stand, the women shaded by parasols. Vendors wore large hats to shield their faces from the sun; their calls occasionally rose above the general din. “You should see this when there’s no war. Tables sag with items from all over the Caribbean, and shoppers barely have room to stand.”
As 2012 turns into 2013, Pamela reflects on the lasting impact of her ex-husband’s Gómez clan, the consequences of her ongoing passivity in the face of challenge, and the impact of the unresolved Morrison case on her new marriage to upper-class Luis.
The fact that the Palmer clan abhors confrontation doesn’t help Pamela’s struggle with her mother-in-law, her family’s heritage and choices, and her difficult contemplation of Laura Morrison’s death in the rainforest. Her discovery of her family’s hidden tragedy leads to further anguish as Pamela struggles while other characters, including treasure hunter Henry Erlich, matriarch Angela Colón and her adopted son Eduardo, and possible murderer José Martín, are drawn into murky waters of connection and dysfunction.
When a scandal Pamela’s mother professes to know nothing about produces new evidence that she was involved, the quest for truth embraces characters who each hold special interests in the past and a revised notion of what the future will bring.
Robinson’s story neatly merges the disparate worlds of Idaho and Puerto Rico, the questions involving family legacy and truths, and the impact of a woman’s murder as the years pass.
Libraries and readers seeking a novel nicely steeped in Puerto Rican culture, investigative twists and turns, and the intersection of family truths and lies will welcome how Under the Tree Ferns provides sinuous connections between characters whose ambitions and perceptions shift as new realizations emerge.
Replete with a powerful sense of community and individual responsibility, Under the Tree Ferns is a story that proves hard to put down, coming full circle in an unexpected manner to reveal a real treasure of discovery.
Under the Tree FernsReturn to Index
Up From
Hell
Joan
Moran
Next
Chapter
979-8255314522
$11.99
Paperback/$3.99 eBook/$32.92
Hardcover
Website:
https://books2read.com/u/4Xy6v9
Ordering:
https://www.amazon.com/Up-Hell-Echoes-Past-Central/dp/B0GWF8BQLT
Up From Hell is the first book in the crime thriller trilogy Echoes of the Past: Crimes in Central Texas. The story tells of Neil Dixon, a Texas police officer who struggles with departmental corruption even as he seems to have escaped his Las Vegas upbringing and drug-addicted mother.
Life has a way of coming full circle, however, as Neil is drawn back to Las Vegas, meets his father for the first time, and becomes embroiled in a chain of events that impact his Texas life.
Joan Moran creates a likeable, admirable character in Neil, employing the first person to bring his world alive. Readers walk alongside his evolution in police work and personal life through vivid descriptions that capture atmosphere in especially evocative ways:
I’d been a rookie for six miserable months, with six more ahead of me. Still, that morning, I got to the station at seven-thirty sharp. Hollister strolled in after eight, carrying a Coke and a burrito that smelled like someone had microwaved a garlic bomb.
Equally powerful are revelations about family which continue to affect his future:
As my mind churned with the weight of my father, a memory from childhood surfaced—Gary driving me to school in Vegas, talking about my mom’s illness. “Secrets are secrets until they’re not,” he said. Back then, I didn’t understand. Now, I was starting to see light.
The juxtapositions of past experience and influence and present-day challenges involving cartels, politics, and shifting alliances make Neil not just a likeable, believable character, but one whose moral and ethical dilemmas immerse readers in unexpected situations that will give rise to questions about their own decision-making processes.
Issues of justice, redemption, pulling threads of connection to arrive at unexpected truths and new realizations, and the impact of law enforcement efforts on changing future possibilities coalesce in a story which is riveting, psychologically astute, and hard to predict.
Libraries seeking thrillers that sizzle with action and tales of crime and betrayal will find Up From Hell a fine acquisition worthy of high recommendation to readers interested in tales of corruption, growth, and professional evolution in law enforcement circles.
Neil’s life can look like hell, but driving it are the forces of growth, truth, and new opportunities which embrace all manner of possibilities, from romance to redemption. It makes for a crime thriller that’s packed with personality and proves hard to put down.
Up From HellReturn to Index
The
Water Diamond
CB Wilson
Dog
Tales Furever
978-1964056081
$5.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Water-Diamond-Hunters-Mystery-Book-ebook/dp/B0GX36XNBC
Fans of CB Wilson’s prior Gem Hunters mystery series will relish The Water Diamond, which draws diamond detective Taylor “Hunter” into a new grand theft case involving a diamond bracelet gone missing from an Art Deco Exhibition. The case of missing jewelry quickly turns into a murder investigation as history, an heiress, and a puzzle lead Hunter and her diamond-sniffing dachshund Glimmer into a mystery that holds its roots not just in the past, but in environments worlds away from one another.
The mystery opens not with Hunter’s efforts, but a refreshingly intriguing statement made by Merle’s twin sister:
He’s found me. You must protect the diamonds.
The admonition and warning come from a portent that places life-saving efforts above the reality of a marriage to a man Merle never loved.
This 1929 opener leads neatly into present-day conundrums as Hunter’s first-person reflection on how law enforcement efforts “run in her blood” introduces newcomers to the backdrop of her life and specialty. Her expertise, honed from the fact that she’s a jewel thief’s daughter, lends special reinforcement to her investigative skills.
As she meets fellow jeweler Mr. Wise, who questions her role as a recovery specialist, inadvertently leads the Teutonic Knights to new power as they’ve long awaited a reason to rise again, and comes to question her own carefully-honed abilities, Hunter discovers that her latest case may lead her into new revelations about frontier Arizona as well as her unique approach to problem-solving.
CB Wilson’s ongoing ability to build a fine mystery around not just whodunit, but why, adds the psychological depth that turns a mystery into a powerful probe of self-inspection and heritage:
...had we been chasing shadows shaped by our own childhood fears?
Family ties, personal vendettas, and a father’s lasting legacy to his daughters add to a tale powerful in its elements of not just recovery, but discovery, which operate on diverse levels of surprise and revelation.
Libraries seeking a standalone series addition replete with fast-paced action and secrets surrounding ambition will find The Water Diamond a powerfully compelling acquisition that will attract readers with high drama and hidden messages.
Its ability to forge a tale impossible to put down cements its plot with a jewel thief’s wisdom, a daughter’s quest for answers, and a spunky little dog. Each contributes satisfyingly unpredictable elements to this tale of transformation.
The Water DiamondReturn to Index
The
Accidental Future of Dean Harris
Derek
McFadden
Papillon
du Père Publishing
978-1-915221-21-6
$15.99
Paperback/$4.99 eBook
www.Papillon-du-Pere.com
The Accidental Future of Dean Harris is a novel presented in vignettes about a writer who searches for and achieves literary success – only to find that his heart’s desire brings with it a challenge to his ideals of life, death, and achievement.
The delivery of Dean’s misadventures and literary pursuits assumes an unusual form that invites readers into his perceptions and experiences from its opening lines:
We’re seated next to each other, you and me, in a warm, metaphorical train car aboard a sleek, metaphorical train when you stop reading your book, insert a bookmark, glance over, and ask me what I do for work. I’m not sure why you ask. Maybe the temperature invites discourse. I work at all hours, I tell you. Then I realize— in part thanks to the quizzical look on your face—that you aren’t in search of a vague, opaque answer from me. You want more. A real conversation to pass the time.
What Dean does is write. His output syncs with his inner concept of who he is – until everything changes. Derek McFadden chronicles Dean’s evolutionary process in six sections of revelations which are interconnected, but fluctuate in time, place, and considerations.
These may challenge readers used to a linear timeline of events and sequential discoveries, but will thoroughly delight in drawing close connections between the visions of disabled Dean, literary achiever, and other incarnations as he considers the courses of his life and impact of both chance and his choices:
A young Dean Harris was impressed but remained appropriately dubious. I didn’t think his Heaven was the real Heaven, but there was a chance Dad and I were unfair years ago in our judgment of the book and the man. If Heaven’s Gate was right, then when I got up there, my palsy would be gone, and people wouldn’t see me as a disabled drain on society (as my drunk stepfather did, and as I too often saw myself). I’d be the writer Dad and I had always known I could be, and folks would demand early access to my latest heavenly releases!
Readers contemplate a plethora of influences, from a father’s relationship with his son to the importance of Dean’s dog, Blackberry, to Dean’s relationship with girlfriend Claire, plus his living with a disability, regrets and self-permission, and more. The dovetailing of personalities, themes, life cycles and encounters, and the ultimate question of whether Dean’s future is truly accidental makes for a thought-provoking journey that considers the ultimate impacts of all kinds of events and choices.
Librarians seeking a literary novel that puts disability and achievement in a different light will welcome how The Accidental Future of Dean Harris builds its characters and revised images of success, failure, and what lies in between.
Its ability to draw with dreams, visions of the future, and revised connections makes for a winning story that is hard to put down.
The Accidental Future of Dean HarrisReturn to Index
The Body
on the Bricks
Leonard
Krishtalka
Anamcara Press
978-1-960462-75-6
$22.99
www.leonardkrishtalka.com
Kansas Daily Tribune intrepid reporter Mary Fanning, hero of The Body on the Bed, returns in another historical mystery that combines fact and fiction in a superb Kansas setting to invite both historical fiction and suspense readers to partake of a vivid new adventure.
Here, Mary faces circumstances in 1873 which leads her to write, “There is madness about.” Yes, and it’s about to descend on her career, life, and discoveries.
The first thing to note about The Body on the Bricks is how deftly Leonard Krishtalka weaves together facts and embellishes them with dramatic flair using narrative, conversation, and high drama to pitch the story. Readers need have no familiarity with the prior book, its protagonist, or its setting in order to fall neatly into this Kansas milieu in which a series of murders falls into the news that Mary’s charged with reporting.
The trouble is, Mary can’t stop digging into the truth. And what emerges is more than a series of heat-inducted rages or coincidences, but a deadly series of snarls that embroils Mary and her readers in a gripping saga that entwines the lives of Lawrence residents young and old with bigger-picture plots.
Reports about the town’s personalities don’t just stem from Mary’s pen, but come from editors and other observers who capture succinct notes about these town influencers:
When Lewis and Clark made their expedition they recorded in their log that a beautiful young woman was the belle of the community in the hamlet at the foot of the steep rise forty miles west of Westport landing. This rise, of course, has come to be known as Mount Oread, and the “beautiful young woman” was none other than our own Dutch Dooka.
From witnesses to seemingly cold calculated shootings to ambushes, executions, accessories to murder, and strangers who manage to stay distant despite small-town gossip, Krishtalka has a flair for adding realistic backdrops of the times and daily life to give his historical story a firm grounding in “you are here” experiences:
Mary woke at six-thirty on Wednesday morning, steeped a full jar of Arbuckle’s Ariosa coffee, and hurried over to the boardinghouse on Massachusetts Street. The city was asleep, save for five boys sweeping the wooden walks in front of the stores, and Mr. Pike heading to open his restaurant on the corner.
This invites readers into a story that is not just mystery or history, but a plain good read, reflecting the culture, atmosphere, and concerns of its times in a thoroughly compelling manner.
Libraries seeking crossover titles that skillfully move between genres to attract a wider audience will want to add The Body on the Bricks to their collections whether or not they’ve imbibed of The Body on the Bed.
Its exquisite capturing of the times, reporter Mary’s personality and drive, and the insights and experiences of a cast of small town people that swirl around her contributes to a story that is vivid, exciting, and satisfyingly hard to predict – or put down.
The Body on the BricksReturn to Index
Dear
Denver
Jaclyn
Duden
Atmosphere
Press
979-8901741672
$30.99
(HC), $18.99 (PB), $8.99 (ebook)
https://atmospherepress.com/books/dear-denver-by-jaclyn-duden/
Dear Denver is a novel told entirely through journal entries about a Tennessee visitor who leaves a blank journal at a Denver bus stop and invites strangers to write:
Howdy, Denver. My name is Kelly Rugsdon. I have purchased this journal for y’all to write in. I’d like to hear anything you want to say. You don’t have to sign your name; you can leave it blank or make a pen name if you like.
As contributors to the journal pen their experiences, perceptions, lives, and insights, readers receive an invigorating series of contrasts and insights into American life that come from interesting, unexpected points of view.
Readers may not expect the scope and depth of these writings. Fictional though they may be, they capture segments of American society in interesting stages of questioning, flux, and realization that prove thought-provoking and unusual for their variety and viewpoints:
If I don’t fight enough for LGBTQ rights in front of all my queer companions, they’ll feel betrayed because I’m so involved in the church. If I don’t stay in the church, I won’t find a husband who is a good Christian but loves gay people and who will do what I tell him to do and financially support my superb taste in wine and spirits. I need it all. This is something I have given considerable thought to. I’m not sure if there’s any other way.
From Mauve’s insights into bedrooms and private spaces and the qualities which have caused her to fall in love with Jeremiah to Greg’s realizations about the influence he may have cast upon his daughter in his desire for a son after she comes out as transgender, the entries are thought-provoking, varied, and reflect a diverse cross-section of society:
What kind of man makes his own daughter believe she is a boy? How neglectful would a parent have had to be for a child to come out disbelieving their own gender? Did I spend too much one-on-one time with her? Did my desire for a boy show so much that I have done this to her?
The shared stories and lives create dialogues even as they explore the perceptions and rationales behind decision-making and life outlook, making for a novel rich in comparisons and emotional connections.
Libraries and readers that choose Dear Denver will relish the opportunity to discuss the nature and depth of these connections in book clubs and reading groups. The diversity of these characters and their candid sharing of lives create an enriching series of experiences that deserve not just food for thought, but avid discussion in women’s groups, reading circles, and any discussion centered on life connections and experiences.
Dear DenverReturn to Index
Death
and All That Follows
Javier
Pinol Serra
Atmosphere
Press
979-8901741252
$17.99
Paperback; $29.99 Hardcover;
$7.99 ebook
www.atmospherepress.com
Death and All That Follows tells of twins Sara and Nico, who return home to bury their mother and confront their past. It opens with a prologue set in 1981 which reviews Sara’s relationship with her Guatemalan mother Raquel. Sara is thirteen and is tackling a special feeling of loneliness.
Fast forward to 1997. Sibling Nico is journeying back to the coastal town of Santa Magdalena with Sara in the aftermath of their mother’s demise. As adults, each has chosen a very different path in life – Sara is a lawyer, while Nico is still searching for his place in the work world and life.
Each tackles grief and family in different ways - but the real challenge comes from joining together to confront the secrets of their childhood, which range from trauma and abuse to unacknowledged pain and connections that ripple into their adult choices and lives.
Intriguing, potentially controversial (certainly fodder for book club debate) revelations emerge from each character’s life and choices, which originated in these early influences:
In college, it made her sad: hearing friends talk about orgasms, losing boys she cared for because they were sexually unsatisfied. But the sadness curdled into anger. Anger at being used. At trying to break the curse by sleeping with every pervert who offered to walk her home. The more she tried to escape it, the sicker she felt. She started smoking to ward them off. She ruled courtrooms because nothing repelled a man’s man more than a successful woman. But they always came back. And a part of her—some small, shameful part—wanted them to.
Some bruises never fade. As Nico and Sara confront their monsters in different ways, readers are drawn into an engaging story of grief, obsession, and most of all, coping methods either logical or unhealthy.
Libraries seeking literary fiction that delves into psychological adaptations and life choices will find Death and All That Follows a thought-provoking story of family relationships, the lasting impact of trauma, and the influences on change which emerge from confronting the past.
Replete with moments of cultural revelation as well as individual contemplation, the story creates many engrossing realizations that readers will find thoroughly absorbing:
“Your mother fell in love with someone outside of her circumstance. And if you belong to the high ranks of Guatemalan society, well, there’s nothing more despicable in their eyes. Those hateful, ignorant eyes.”
Death and All That FollowsReturn to Index
Delta
Heat
Scott
Petinga
HRTLND
979-8-234-06056-3
$15.99
(paperback and audiobook) $4.99
(eBook)
Website:
www.discoverdeltaheat.com
Delta Heat is a Southern gothic novel steeped in the atmosphere and culture of the Mississippi Delta, a milieu which encourages romance, deception, discovery, and tradition – especially with regard to women.
On the surface, Delta Heat is also about justice and courtroom proceedings - but scratch that surface to find important underlying messages about empowerment, female roles and choices, and a portrait of modern dynamics in which a man's grip on control crumbles as a woman reaches for her own.
The
playlist of songs that Scott
Petinga had on rotation while writing this story inspired the novel’s
descriptive sense of place, and it should be seriously considered as
a backdrop for appreciating the evolving tale. The author's curated
playlists for Delta Heat are available on both
Apple Music and
Spotify. From Tanya Tucker’s rendition of “Delta Dawn”
to Elmore James’s powerful “The Sky Is Crying,” readers who add
these songs to their playlists will find they contribute to the story
from its opening lines, as protagonist Amy gets off a Greyhound bus
prepared for battle:
“This
was no stranger’s land; no
faraway battleground circled on a map. This was the Delta—sacred,
wounded, humming with its own slow grief—and it was hers, in blood
and in duty.”
In passages that frame war as a Southern inheritance and women as a force to be reckoned with, Delta Heat brings forth vivid characters whose lifelong bonds to the land seem destined to outlast the schemes of slick men who would change it, as the elderly Ms. Dupree observes:
She thumped her chest. “This marsh, this mud, this river —it beats inside us. Cut it, and we bleed.” Her gaze drifted out over the water where dragonflies sketched silver loops. “Every critter out yonder got a songbird ridin’ the thermals, catfish whiskerin’ the silty deep, cypress knees hummin’ low. Break one string, the whole tune goes sour.” She fixed Amy with a wink. “Now, folk in shiny shoes gonna wave papers and numbers like they got answers— promisin’ jobs, shiny roads, a future so bright you’ll need shades. But they forget: even the slickest sermon can’t sweettalk a river into runnin’ backward.”
From community victories and the economic hardship they bring to the residents of Yazoo County to Amy and Daniel’s discovery of profound resilience and renewed purpose under the most challenging of conditions, Petinga’s story of Delta interests and personalities is rife with the politics and connections of land and people.
Though its depictions of volunteers and characters with unique knowledge of the roles that belief and empowerment play in shaping choice and vision, Delta Heat crafts a gripping saga of a woman who refuses to compromise, a man who grows to love her, and a community at a crossroads over its own future.
Libraries and readers seeking a novel steeped in Southern sentiments, personalities, environmental issues, and contrasts between justice and love will find Delta Heat simmers with passion and power. It will prove a mighty testimony to the resilience and determination of all manner of people who advocate for conservation and for self determination.
Delta HeatReturn to Index
Ghost Gun
cc ECK
Midblock Press
979-8-9955407-0-0
$15.99 (paperback);
$4.99 (eBook)
Website: https://www.cceckauthor.com
Mobile, Alabama is the setting of the novel Ghost Gun, which focuses on a racially mixed family whose present-day lives are shaped by past racial violence and modern assumptions.
The story opens with a bang as it outlines one such assumption:
Everyone thought she was my nanny. That’s how she tells it. Just assumed she was another Caribbean immigrant caring for another white kid whose parents were working downtown. I guess correcting people was exhausting, because after a few months she began to just go with it. Sometimes she’d even speak in a ridiculous Jamaican accent to make me laugh and to match the expectations of whatever well-intentioned but stupid-as-fuck white mother or father was trying to engage. And that’s the issue, really. That’s what they don’t get. What you don’t get. The small concessions made every day, all day, just to get through the day.
Mixed race families can confuse those who would peg behaviors and racial profiles to expectations and assumption. From “snap origin stories” to tumultuous family relationships and thought-provoking contrasts between Black and white perceptions, Ghost Gun weaves together a mosaic of racial interactions to create a powerful set of revelations and insights as Natasha navigates familiar and unfamiliar territory:
I tried the first door, but it was locked. Tried the second and it opened into what appeared to be a preschool room. Or maybe Bible study for youngsters. Sunday school? There were small chairs around tables and bookcases along the far wall. A circular carpet in the middle of the room. What did I know about what might happen in a space like this? My parents never took me to church unless we were down here, and for that we were always the special guests, not part of the fabric of everyday activity.
The plot doesn’t just rest on her impressions, however, moving between multiple first-person voices (Natasha, Elijah, Neil Engel, Zora), as well as two third-person voices (LaVonn and Willamita Patterson).
From love and churches to civil rights issues and sibling relationships, Ghost Gun comments on underlying social influences and prejudices in all kinds of ways that emerge both outside of and within the family:
He’s always been The Golden Child in the eyes of Dad and Mom, but now that we’re here and he’s sitting up there on stage in cap and gown, I can see the bigger perspective too. They all love him, his teachers and classmates, and now I see that it really goes back to the beginning. Like it’s all been some self-fulfilling prophecy that was set in motion on the day of his birth which, when you think about it, isn’t really that different or unique than how it’s been for thousands of years, at least in the West and in terms of Anglo cultures. Or really most cultures. All hail the Firstborn Boy Child! Primogeniture is the rightful way, as God on high hath ordained. Hold him high above your head and let the gathered masses witness his beauty and inevitable might. Love him now, fear him later.
cc ECK shifts points of view between Natasha, Neil Engel, and LaVonn & Willamita Patterson, moving between first-person observation and third-person reflection as different facets of relationships and life interactions are revealed.
This creates a powerful series of contrasts in experience and expectation that neatly consider actions, choices, consequences, and character growth.
Ghost Gun is especially highly recommended for book clubs interested in discussions surrounding race, survival tactics, prejudice, assumptions about family and life connections, and religious perceptions of what constitutes “righteous” choices.
Libraries that choose Ghost Gun for their collections will find it replete with insights and power that flows from the interactive strength of its characters into different kinds of battles won and lost in families, communities, and American society.
Ghost GunReturn to Index
In
Darkness and Light
Tudor
Alexander
Boyle
& Dalton
979-8-90183-045-1
www.BoyleandDalton.com
In Darkness and Light is a historical novel companion to Tudor Alexander’s The Last Patient and follows a Jewish family’s trials in Rumania during the deportations that preceded the country’s transition to authoritarian rule during the war. If this sounds familiar, it’s all the more pointed for its mirror of modern events.
Tudor Alexander opens the story with two women who are embarking on new phases in their lives. Floria, five months pregnant, has just married and moved in with her new husband. Her former roommate Tina has moved in with another medical student and is pursuing her studies.
Both women have absorbed the contentions of communism about equality: “...it doesn’t matter if one is Jewish or Romanian. Communism taught us that.” The post-war environment seems to negate the experiences of Jewish people during the war, and Tina has fully embraced the contentions of Communism about connecting to the working class through labor:
“Learning a trade is useful, and it helps us understand the working class and their just struggle. I’ve been working on and off as a seamstress since before the war when, in Câmpulung, they expelled all the Jews from high school. As for you, look how much you’ve achieved! A well-known poet, in charge of a major publication.”
But those who would change as the status quo shifts find their work cut out for them as they toe a fine line between Communist ideals and political mandate:
The work on the publication proved complex and time-consuming. The courier showed up every Monday morning with news from the war. Iulian had Monday afternoons and Tuesdays to condense the information and present it in a clear and succinct manner, along with a lead article for the week. He was careful to include relevant excerpts from Stalin’s book, as well as from other books by Marxist leaders Emma brought for him from Timișoara.
From how illegal Communist thought permeates the 1944 milieu and its backdrop of World War II to Tina’s own creation of new life and opportunities that both buffet and come with it, Alexander crafts a powerful novel of lives in upheaval, with all the hope and choices involved as political swirls of change sweep various characters into new ethical and moral dilemmas.
Life goes on, as is demonstrated by Alexander’s juxtaposition of these lives and the forces which direct their courses.
Of special note and interest is how the characters find their political associations under fire in new ways:
The rumors, the explanations, and the stories he heard and shared with Tina were each more preposterous than the next. Until his reporters received their special instructions from the Central Committee, they weren’t allowed to investigate or write anything about this leadership change. With her gone, he feared he might lose his position. He was her protege. But how much time did he still have? Would they come to arrest him?
Perhaps it’s the changing times, but it feels as though In Darkness and Light could not have been published at a better moment in time to give modern Americans food for thought about all kinds of social and political influences.
The characters are realistic and their motivations varied, the focus on family, political, and social relationships is wonderfully detailed with a myriad of characters offsetting one another with special insights and experiences, and the novel shines with a rich realism that is attractive and compelling.
Librarians that choose In Darkness and Light for their collections will find it stands nicely alone as well as a companion to Alexander’s The Last Patient, profiling the strengths and vulnerabilities of women and individuals who became at risk in a changing world.
In Darkness and LightReturn to Index
Las
Mujeres
BJ Taylor
Atmosphere
Press
979-8901740927
$16.99
Paperback; $28.99 Hardcover;
$8.99 ebook
www.atmospherepress.com
Las Mujeres is a literary historical novel set in 1800s Mexico that revolves around the women in the life of narrator Don Miguel. These are: Moroccan doctor/midwife Doña Isabel; his grandmother, the Dowager Marquesa Gavilan; his cousin, Doña Leticia; and a cadre of house fairies and Aztec deities who help mortals.
Mexico is moving from being a colony to a Republic, with all the political struggle and ideological shifts that occur with social and cultural change. Augmenting this scenario is a sense of magical realism which injects a different flavor of influence and inspection into the experiences of Mexican mortals.
Justice, spiritual redemption, mysticism, and personal evolution entwine in this story, injecting just the right degree of intrigue and interest as a murder investigation draws Don Miguel ever closer to truths about his own life and its future.
Dialogues between men, women, and forces operating on different levels of Mexican culture will spark both interest and reflective moments in readers:
As aristocrats in the New Republic of Mexico, we do not enjoy the outrageous privileges once held during colonial times. EVERYONE must be accountable, especially for the murder of working-class people. Because our constituents will not abide favors extended to landowners when ordinary citizens fought and died for independence.
Some might think a prior familiarity with Mexican history or the times will be a prerequisite to enjoying this novel, but BJ Taylor incorporates all the information and elements needed to thoroughly understand what motivates those who see their government and lives in flux.
Life unravels, then comes back together in a very different way as Las Mujeres evolves an atmosphere blending political intrigue with social issues.
Librarians seeking a novel that balances magical realism with the heady realizations of realistic characters whose lives are buffeted by personal and political processes will find Las Mujeres a fine acquisition. It’s highly recommendable to readers who enjoy stories of justice, redemption, depicting men and women who bow to the forces of social and political change, but emerge from the fray more empowered.
Las MujeresReturn to Index
The
Music Room
Margaret
Farrell Kirby
Proving
Press
979-8901830482
$25.95
Hardcover/$16.95 Paperback/$7.99
eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Music-Room-Margaret-Farrell-Kirby/dp/B0GQH7GXML
The Music Room is a novel about grief, recovery, and family that follows the story of Cath Breslin, who was twenty when her mother died, burying her dream of becoming a writer in the wake of overwhelming grief. Thirty years later, Cath still has not really come to terms with the past, even though she’s happy with her own marriage and family.
How would her life be different if she had continued to reach for her dreams? Cath’s enrollment in a writing class not only reconstitutes her possible talents, but resurrects emotions about her mother’s death and their connection, resulting in unexpected changes to her life.
Is Cath having a midlife crisis, or is this turn of events about what she’s too successfully buried of her past which is rising anew to change her future? Cath’s questions receive succinct and hard-hitting description early in the story:
Perhaps it wasn’t so simple. Did she expect too much? For life to be happy, neat, tied together with no doubts, no discontent? A perfection of sorts?
Cath’s discoveries are poignantly presented as her memoir takes the form of a special self-examination that delves deeply into her relationship with her mother and the choices she made surrounding her life and death:
“Your death thrust me into the unfamiliar territory of grief. My world turned inside out. I couldn’t accept it as true. As time passed and the pain ebbed, you were receding from me. The anguish kept me connected to you in a visceral way. I needed the pain to keep you close. It was like another leaving.
“But I buried your words and my dream of writing. Not wanting to let go of my grief—my connection to you—I worked in the hospital where you had been a patient.
“But after a time I found you in the music room. It’s where I visit you and ‘talk to you.' And now, as I write about you, I feel closer. I am trying to recover the person I was.”
As Cath performs the cathartic release of writing, she also moves closer to new possibilities in her life which involve meetings with strangers, assuming the role of detective in a mystery about the past, and re-examining the nature of friendships and life connections.
Margaret Farrell Kirby’s story is more about grief and recovery. It’s about the long-term impact of decisions made in life, and how one woman reconciles her actions with renewed purpose to forge new relationships while sometimes battering old ones.
Also notable is how Cath’s process affects her relationship with husband Matthew who, despite being a psychiatrist, doesn’t know how to help her as she becomes more distant and keeps secrets from him.
Librarians seeking women’s fiction that embraces all kinds of life challenges, from the death of a parent to the evolution of a long-term marriage, will find The Music Room a powerful survey of new beginnings and old habits that will lend especially well to women’s book clubs and reading groups.
Packed with realistic, involving insights into Cath’s world, The Music Room is filled with notes of music and discovery that will prove hard to put down.
The Music RoomReturn to Index
No Home
Without You
Lena
Gibson
Black
Rose Writing
978-1-68513-766-3
$6.99 eBook/$21.95
Paperback
Website:
https://lenagibsonauthor.ca/
Ordering:
https://www.amazon.com/No-Home-Without-You-Post-Apocalyptic-ebook/dp/B0GSMZSRZM
No Home Without You is the third book in a post-apocalyptic romance series and takes place seven years after an asteroid strikes the Earth, changing the world forever.
Two individuals are the focal point of this journey: Lissa, a loner who lives in an abandoned mansion in Nebraska, and Cam, who has grown up in the sheltered Vita xTerra survivalist community and is on his own after defying orders to not help a refugee family.
Readers may anticipate the usual outcome – romance – but Lena Gibson evolves this from a friendship and a parting. Events only bring the two star-crossed lovers back together when Lissa stumbles upon a plot that threatens xTerra and Cam, then she is compelled to undertake a dangerous journey to reconnect with and help him.
Peppered into the story of this evolving relationship are additional moving reconnections with a damaged world. Gibson is especially adept at injecting these moments into the overall bigger picture to give readers a satisfying “you are here” feeling that points to how rejuvenation and connection can exist even in the darkest of days:
She inhaled the scent of thawing earth, relishing the rich aroma that meant spring was warming the frozen land. Soon, leaves would return to the trees, blossoms to the flowers, and birds would be everywhere, their calls filling the forest with sound. Animals would have young, and insects would hatch and arrive to provide background noise. Everywhere around her, life and color would return. Spring was usually her favorite time.
Family relationships, however fractured by ideology, also enter into the picture as Lissa confronts her potential mate’s mother in an unusually candid manner:
“You came here to meet me. Now you have. Cam was kind enough to let me stay here while my shoulder heals. It’s a shame you can’t see him the way I do. He cooks delicious food, helps with any task, remembers everything he’s read, and thinks about other’s feelings. Including yours, even if you don’t deserve it. We don’t want you here. You call yourself a mother, but all I see is an angry, bitter woman grasping at power she no longer has. What we do is none of your business. I’ll see you out.”
With the focus on nature, family, love, and growth, Gibson gently guides readers through the process of reconnecting. While prior readers will especially appreciate this latest book’s depth in expanding the challenges that move beyond daily survival into moral and ethical territory, newcomers won’t be lost, and will relish how Cam and Lissa find their way.
Many books about survivalism incorporate romance into the picture. No Home Without You stands strongly alongside such books as Linda Howard’s After Sundown as an exceptional study in not the daily evolution of a community, but the reinvention of humanity and kindness, which begins with Lissa and Cam’s special challenges to accept and meld with one another.
Vivid, realistic, and thought-provoking, No Home Without You is steeped in the basic quandaries of not just survival, but regaining humanity. It’s a top recommendation for readers of apocalyptic fiction who look for human connections in the physical struggle to exist.
No Home Without YouReturn to Index
The
Pebble in the Pond
Suzanne
Groves
Atmosphere
Press
979-8901741214
$19.99 Paperback/$8.99
eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Pebble-Pond-Tale-Stuarts-Landing/dp/B0GHF9GFRT
In The Pebble in the Pond: A Tale of Stuarts Landing, Miriam Llewelyn’s move to Stuart’s Landing was supposed to represent a fresh start in her life. Instead, it turns into a reason for questioning small town relationships and her own connections in life when her presence threatens the social hierarchy in ways she couldn’t have predicted. A family secret, powerful long-held relationships within the community, Miriam’s new friendships and a few enemies, and tragedy shape the landscape of her “new beginning.”
As a social war emerges against an entrenched cotillion and long-held traditions, characters such as Louise Winston Caldwell’s daughter Emma find themselves questioning the set trajectories of their lives:
“C’mon, Em,” her father said. “You’re smarter than this.”
Smarter than challenging the mighty Louise Winston Caldwell, or smarter than standing up for what I believe?
As the women of Stuart’s Landing find their differences and backgrounds clashing, readers will appreciate the many references to past connections and situations that raise new questions about relationships and community-building - especially in the face of an emerging tragedy that shakes everyone’s foundations.
Tradition, ambition, and personal ties coalesce in a small-town story that embraces the choices, consequences, and growth of residents whose lives are all impacted by Miriam’s arrival and past.
Suzanne Groves creates a powerful juxtaposition of personalities and special interests with historical precedents that simmer under the surface of present-day challenges. As the lives of Bitsy Butler, Louise’s friend, and others turn in unexpected directions, readers will appreciate both the warmth and competition of women’s lives in Stuart’s Landing and appreciate how finely woven are the threads of connection and competition that drive newcomers and long-time residents alike.
Librarians interested in small-town stories about women forced to adapt secrets of the past to circumstances of the present will find this story replete with entwined lives, convictions and challenges:
Once the women finished their crème brûlée, Bitsy thanked them for lunch and departed, leaving a trail of sadness in her wake. “Louise will get through this,” Iris said, finishing her wine. “But you can’t do it for her, nor would she want you to. Besides… we have a building to renovate and a business to birth!” Miriam wished she shared Iris’s pragmatism.
Book clubs and individual readers will appreciate how The Pebble in the Pond sends ripples of possibility and change through these seemingly disparate lives as loyalties are tested, long-held ties questioned, and mysteries are tackled.
The Pebble in the PondReturn to Index
Red
Horizons
James
Bultema
P.D.
Publishing
979-8-988075103
$5.99
eBook -Softbound $19.99
-Hardbound $25.99
Website:
https://www.jamesbultema.com/
Ordering:
https://www.amazon.com/Red-Horizons-James-Bultema/dp/B0GTTM7GLM
Red Horizons is a military novel that envisions a surprise attack by North Korea on the U.S. This embroils the nation in a conflict that tests Navy pilots Jesse Hampton and his wife Sarah Freedman.
Both face increasing danger in the skies and observe the costs of the war as battle engagements result in more and more lost lives and strategies that seem to contribute more danger and confrontation than solutions.
James Bultema builds this gathering storm with an attention to not just these individual experiences and perceptions, but a myriad of involvements on both sides, shifting from American to North Korean perspectives as he builds a battle in which all ages and personalities find a role:
One face among hundreds, Private Kim Hae-min sat in the second row of Unit 121’s cyber operations hall. His equipment was battered, and his constantly sticky keyboard was missing the N key. He wasn’t one of the code architects, nor was he an officer who wrote the attack scripts. His task was execution and maintenance, simple enough for a nineteen-year-old to handle but crucial because every mistake could unravel the entire deception.
President Preston oversees a national emergency as a strike against the Navy that claims the lives of thousands of military men leads to the awakening of the “sleeping giant” America in more ways than one.
Especially notable and powerful are the costs of this war on everyday individuals on both sides. Bultema’s “you are here” descriptions pull no punches, describing the ultimate costs of battles that immerse civilians and military fighters as Japan becomes part of the collateral damage of a widening conflict:
As the two entered the bathroom, she heard a deafening, tearing roar that was louder than any thunder she had ever known. Looking down at her only child, she held Mina more tightly. Then their world dissolved into light. The warhead hit Sakamoto’s apartment dead-on.
The result is a military war story that is realistic, thought-provoking, and driven by strong characters whose lives and efforts are changed forever by the struggle.
More so than most military novels of erupting disaster, Red Horizons reaches past major players to depict the spill-over results of battles that move beyond borders to involve ordinary people in all walks of life.
Libraries and readers seeking a military action-packed story that rests not just on strategy and political maneuvering, but the lives of all involved, will find Red Horizons a powerful story of targets, enemies, and an endless war that promises future ramifications whether it’s won or lost.
While the ending is conclusive, the door is left ajar for more. Given the strength and force of the military and social connections made in Red Horizons, this would be a welcome event.
Red HorizonsReturn to Index
Tent City
Amy L.
Bernstein
Open
Books
978-1948598910
$21.95
https://www.open-bks.com/library/moderns/tent-city/about-book.html
By closely considering the microcosm of one American small town hit by economic collapse, Tent City personalizes and expands the choices, circumstances, and individual and community pressures involved in survival tactics and the clash between rich and poor.
When hundreds of tents occupy the backyard of the wealthy King family in the town of Willing, one family is forced to not just witness but participate in the downfall of ordinary lives buffeted by nightmares and forces which are driving costs beyond what anyone can pay.
Observations about the nature of the town itself juxtapose with personal experience in intriguing ways:
As a commercial town, she thinks, Willing is almost more of an idea now, than a reality. It is a town that was, now partially extinct. I am not a dying town.
These are supplemented by social and philosophical reflections that add an extra dimension of insights that will prove perfect for literary or social science book club discussions:
Progress is no longer something you count on, it’s something you bargain for.
As Sylvia and others find their families, relationships, ideals, and choices tested by the expanding tent city and its dystopian vision of a society experiencing a downhill slide, readers will find many moments filled with emotional connections and displays of anger, frustration, and realization about how and why things are changing:
As the conspiracy theories about how and why this is happening wax and wane in popularity, a subterranean deep-seated despair takes hold and remains largely unspoken. But that does not mean such feelings are invisible. Tent City is seething all the time now.
Amy L. Bernstein’s powerful novel reflects modern times with a twist, offering powerful insights into groups that used to work together and now find themselves seemingly at odds, but connected in unusual ways.
The food for thought generated by this social and psychological examination will prove especially compelling for readers seeking literary reflections of present and future dilemmas surrounding haves and have-nots, simmering frustrations on all sides, and the raise of poverty that both births Tent City and portends its ultimate collapse, as well.
Librarians seeking a haunting, evocative consideration of a family facing forces of change both within its structure and from outside will find Tent City a thoroughly compelling story of Everytown which, like Every Man, represents universal themes of the casualties in a war “not of their making” whose lives “are already shaped by its consequences.”
Tent CityReturn to Index
True to
Your Boots
Lexie
Sloane
Caffeinated
Llama
979-8-9953316-0-5
$18.99 Paperback/$8.99 E-Book
www.Lexiesloane.com
True to Your Boots is a novel that opens with the realization of a husband’s dream to own a ranch and widowed Ava’s determination to make that dream real after his passing.
Hidden Meadows Horse Ranch is the dream - but Ava is derailed mid-pursuit of that ideal by a strip mall, a small daughter, and a handsome man.
In short order, her life changes from all three influences, moving far beyond her husband’s dreams and into territory as vivid and uncertain as the risks she once took with her beloved husband.
As Ava steps into her independence only to find it threatened by romance, readers join her foray into single parenthood, love, and business management which takes the form of a romp through temptation, progress, horses, family, and love.
Lexie Sloane crafts a vivid story, following the first-person revelations of Ava as she recovers and struggles with loss, grief, and moving on to rebuild her life. The insights about how and why she’s making these decisions capture especially poignant moments of realization and enlightenment:
Nina stared at me, probably wondering why I was crying. She didn’t understand the permanence of death. She wouldn’t think of all the missed opportunities and plans we’d never make. Birthdays, holidays, family trips… I wasn’t just grieving for him. I mourned the loss of all the things we’d looked forward to. That was why I had to buy Hidden Meadows. Our future was on its deathbed.
Even more important are thought-provoking moments of growth Ava experiences in many different ways as she steps into a new future and grapples with influences of the past.
Sloane shifts viewpoints between Ava and Eli, exploring both their lives and experiences in a manner that allows readers to delight in contrasts of experience and growth.
Librarians seeking a conjoined love story in which each character finds their life trajectory changing in response to the other, and circumstances beyond their control, will find it easy to highly recommend True to Your Boots to readers seeking ultimately uplifting stories about change, adaptation, love, and family-building experiences.
Packed with insights about what brings people together and encourages them to adapt, True to Your Boots takes an emotional foray into romance and the kinds of journeys that can lead full circle to home in an unexpected manner.
True to Your BootsReturn to Index
Veil of
Silence
Danielle
Abi-Saab
GFB
978-1-967510-52-8
$18.95 paperback /
$9.99 eBook
Website: https://www.danielleabisaab.com/
Ordering: https://a.co/d/00VQyL2e
War is not just ugly and terrifying; war is sorcerous. It has the power to shrink the entire universe, to shrink the totality of human existence, reducing it to mere survival, to mere waiting: for the end of cowering in a basement, for the end of the bombing, for the end of life itself.
Veil of Silence is a novel that focuses on teen Hoda’s experiences, following the trials and experiences of a life during the Lebanese civil war.
Hoda and her countrymen “survived in this precarious space and time, suspended between fear and hope.” The strength of the story lies in how she found enclaves of survival amidst the usual teen tumult of coming of age and grappling with social expectations and family changes.
Danielle Abi-Saab creates a story steeped in reflections and experiences that also includes unexpected joy in everyday experiences, such as her wedding ceremony and the expectations of marriage that both delight and challenge her:
The reality that she’d been repressing flashed in front of her eyes, a dreary routine of early-morning rising, household cleaning, cooking, and once the kids came, more cleaning, more cooking, and endless evenings of housework. She prayed Tony would be a loving husband, and hoped that before the kids came they would have some fun together as he had promised during his courtship.
As complicated relationships evolve with lover Jihad and secrets that grow to challenge everyday life and family, Hoda moves away from tradition in unexpected ways, navigating unhappiness and the desire for something more than tradition offers.
Readers receive engrossing insights into Lebanese culture in which war is only part of the equation of understanding the religious, social, psychological, and cultural influences of this nation.
What began as a teen’s desire for love amidst the ravages of war evolves into a story about arranged marriages and lives and Hoda’s dreams for a different, possibly better future that brings readers into the changing world of Lebanese family and social conditions.
Librarians seeking a novel based in Lebanon that holds many absorbing reflections on women’s roles and confrontations with tradition will find Veil of Silence a moving saga. It can be highly recommended to women’s reading groups, used for discussions about Lebanese culture, and is replete with stories of family, friendship, and difficult choices.
Veil of SilenceReturn to Index
The AI
Security Imperative
James
Blake
Networlding
Publishing
978-1959993452
$15.00 Paperback/$1.50
eBook
https://www.amazon.com/AI-Security-Imperative-Managing-Emerging/dp/1959993453
The AI Security Imperative: A Leader's Guide to Managing Emerging Risks focuses on all kinds of threats to cyber-security, from phishing and AI-powered cyber attacks to disinformation networks, digital surveillance, challenges to AI decision-making, and reputational threats.
Each topic shifts in nature when influenced by AI’s potential, as James Blake outlines in chapters that address incidents, potential usage, and opportunities to employ AI to thwart many of these threats:
AI provides another important method in establishing this with an opportunity to expand surveillance, information gathering, and targeting, which can be hugely important.
Blake uses risk assessment logic and techniques to link AI to better practices and bigger-picture thinking. These embrace not just business interests and concerns, but social and political game-changing efforts:
Those in power have increasing opportunities to use AI within the context of international crises—they can shape political opinion on events through the skillful use of social media. This has direct implications for the business sector, its strategies, and potentially opportunities and risks that have shaped fortunes since 2015.
Special assessments and insights focus on the use of AI for better or for worse, considering how the usual purposes and approaches of different interests are affected by adding AI into the picture:
AI is an essential driver in the growth and spread of disinformation, particularly in tactical developments, which will likely increase risks to organizations worldwide. This is because AI provides the means for a wider group of threat actors to have the technology available.
The result is an important assessment that should not be limited to business interests alone, but disseminated and discussed in political groups, classrooms holding students of computer, political, and social science, concerned citizens, and libraries interested in a book that goes beyond the scope of most on the topics of security and AI applications.
Packed with historical and social references, The AI Security Imperative draws important connections between leaders, security assessments, AI applications, and many different impacts of AI at all levels of business and society. It should be considered a “must” for any thinking leader and readers interested in how AI might work for and against humans in the future.
The AI Security ImperativeReturn to Index
An
Apache Iliad
W.
Michael Farmer
Otterfield/
Roan & Weatherford
Publishing Associates,
LLC
979-8-89299-102-5
$31.99
Hardcover/$15.99 Paperback/$9.99
eBook
www.roanweatherford.com
An Apache Iliad: True Stories of Geronimo’s War And Reservation Life 1877—1886 should be in any collection strong in Native American history and Apache culture. It gathers powerful facts that don’t appear in many other places, surveying the extent of a ten-year war in which Geronimo and his warriors defied invaders who believed their mountain refuge to be impenetrable.
W. Michael Farmer’s story of how that war was lost through ideological failure rather than physical strategy makes for thoroughly engrossing reading. Audiences will include those already well versed in Geronimo’s story as well as newcomers to Apache history and culture. Farmer traverses this landscape by employing drama and bringing the personalities, intentions, politics, and struggles of the frontier world to life:
Just before dawn three women and a young man (Talbot Gooday, grandson of Loco) went to check on the cooking mescal. Laughing and talking they came within twenty-five feet of the hiding scouts. Knowing the attack was about to happen anyway, the commanding officer ordered the scouts to fire and killed all four––except the army record is wrong––one of the women who ran was killed, the others managed to escape. The Apache had planned to begin an early morning march if the mescal had finished cooking. The shots were an alarm bell, and it put them in instant motion to escape.
The perceptions, strategies for battle and survival, and misconceptions between different peoples, from Natives and whites to Hispanics, create a powerful contrast in lives and intentions that not only brings these times to life, but offers insights unavailable in other considerations of Geronimo’s times.
Of special note are the rivalries and retributions of major players surrounding Geronimo and Apaches which juxtapose Native experiences with the intentions and trials of other groups harboring their own special interests:
Chato thought Chihuahua might be dispirited and sent a woman with an offer to either kill Geronimo or surrender (if Geronimo had been there it might have been his end). Instead, Chihuahua and his brother, Ulzana, knowing that Ulzana’s son had been killed and their families captured, swore vengeance on Chato.
The result not only retells history, but adds historic photos and rare personal source material to embrace the the times and the various peoples struggling for control of their lives and world.
Librarians will find An Apache Iliad dramatic, revealing, surprising in its depth and connections, packed with vividly narrated, true stories that intersect in unexpected ways. It will be easy to recommend to readers interested in Apache history, narrated from source material and enlivened with a “you are here” feel that turns the author’s fifteen years-plus research into a highly accessible, involving story readers won’t forget.
An Apache IliadReturn to Index
An
Essential
Resource for Every Silva Mind Control Method Student: Q&A
By Staff
Lecturers of Silva Mind
Control International Inc.
Compiled
by Jose Silva and Ed Bernd Jr.
G&D
Media
9781722507671
$12.95
Paperback/$9.98 eBook/$14.99
eAudio
https://indiepubs.com/products/qa-an-essential-resource-for-silva-mind-control-method-students-9781722507671
An Essential Resource for Every Silva Mind Control Method Student: Q&A was originally published in 1983 by the Institute of Psychorientology, Inc. and here returns in new packaging to reach new generations of Silva students with an in-depth survey of the programming technique and its promises and pitfalls.
The Q&A format expands upon Silva’s technique by answering common questions about how and why the method works (or doesn’t) and how it can be applied to real-life concerns.
The questions come not from Silva practitioners, but from queries asked and answered over the years in the Silva Mind Control Newsletter and, more recently, on the Silva Method UltraMind websites. Thus, their origins in everyday users and common situations make for an especially useful series of inquiries and applications that help readers work on health problems and benefit more directly from the Silva techniques.
From halting sleepwalking to dealing with relationship problems to addressing stuttering, the range of applied solutions offered in this book survey the extent of Silva applications to real-world situations.
The result is a book that should be required reading for Silva students, offering a treasure trove of applied solutions that expand the Silva techniques into often-unexpected, new directions.
As an adjunct to the Silva course, An Essential Resource for Every Silva Mind Control Method Student: Q&A will prove remarkably invaluable for its insights into the many, many ways the Silva techniques can be applied to daily life issues.
An Essential Resource for Every Silva Mind Control Method Student: Q&AReturn to Index
The Arch
of
Traits
William
K. Snyder
with Alexandra Hale
Precocity
Press
979-8-9941476-5-8
$19.95
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H12MWR6N
The Arch of Traits outlines and reviews ten characteristics common to strong management teams, providing managers with keys to applying these traits to building better businesses. It comes from a turnaround consultant with some thirty years background helping companies recover and grow and focuses on management styles that either contribute to a company’s health or unexpectedly propel it into disaster.
Business readers receive numerous examples of this process and the emotional connections which involve blending turnaround techniques with psychological analysis to create better practices and identify business snafus.
From how too much courage can be a bad thing. One example is the case of Penthouse magazine, which had built a successful run on risqué choices and needed to now learn lessons involving prudence. Another involves tackling the results of surrounding one’s business with “yes men” (exemplified in the case of an electro-mechanical manufacturer whose success had waned). William K. Snyder and Alexandra Hale outline direct connections between success, failure, and the kinds of perceptions and revised focuses that can identify a company’s hidden influencers and why they are no longer working.
Business leaders will appreciate the process of making these connections, which are imparted in an example-packed survey that will help them guide businesses on better courses based on identifying character traits in leaders at all levels, better understanding how their absence or presence can affect a company.
Business managers and owners who would utilize psychological insights for better management practices will find The Arch of Traits an invaluable survey connecting the dots between psychological qualities and leadership success.
Business libraries will find The Arch of Traits very useful, highly recommendable for discussions among business and other leaders and psychology or self-improvement groups.
The Arch of TraitsReturn to Index
Beyond
Bedrails and Bingo
Dave
Devereaux
Layton
Road Press
979-8-9942200-0-9
$17.95
Paperback/$24.95 Hardcover/$9.99
eBook
https://davedevereaux.squarespace.com/
Beyond Bedrails and Bingo: Myths, Truths, and the Future of America's Nursing Homes explores nursing homes in a manner few other books have addressed, considering the stigma and disrespect associated with them, the hidden truths about Medicare and Medicaid and how nursing homes are financed, and why nursing home standards, eligibility, values, and culture seem so broken.
While Dave Devereaux doesn’t let nursing homes off the hook of accountability, he does explain and explore why so many are viewed as detrimental and disasters.
During the course of an open, honest examination that stems from decades as a nursing home administrator, Devereaux considers connections between money and organizational behavior, myths and realities, emerging trends in nursing home care, and more.
Few will know much of the information in this book. It could only be generated from an insider’s long-term experience, and from a level of administration that ordinary workers aren’t privy to.
Take mattresses, for one example ... a touchy subject:
Caregivers are the first line of defense in assessing mattress integrity, and this is evident the instant a bed is stripped. When mattress integrity isn’t maintained, people work harder to compensate for the problem and patient care progress is sustained or improved. Or they don’t, and patients suffer while their health degrades. When basics like a comfortable mattress aren’t provided, it sows distrust among hardworking nursing home staff. This further threatens the home’s credibility. If this cycle goes unbroken, workers break. If workers break, the nursing home breaks.
Funding, reimbursement, patient litigation, and issues of law and aides are all considered in an eye-opening inspection that draws connections between nursing home processes and the systems that support or deter them.
All this information is key to understanding nursing homes – and is why all health libraries and individuals considering nursing homes need to read this book.
Broader in its coverage than most, Beyond Bedrails and Bingo considers the culture of American care and how it is limited, buffeted, or expanded by perception, regulations, and human affairs.
Libraries need to consider Beyond Bedrails and Bingo an essential addition as they stock quality books on healthcare, legal regulations, and consumer information.
Beyond Bedrails and BingoReturn to Index
Congress:
An
Irrelevant Institution or Guardian of the Republic
William
L. Kovacs
Paperback
Press, LLC
978-1-970560-23-7
$9.99
Paperback/$2.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Congress-Irrelevant-Institution-Guardian-Republic/dp/1970560231
Congress: An Irrelevant Institution or Guardian of the Republic describes what most Americans already surmise: Congressional power and operations stand on a precipice that bodes huge changes for the future.
William L. Kovacs considers how America has gotten to this point, documenting decades of expanding presidential power and Congressional erosion, showing that no single party or process is the cause of the issue.
He documents a steady lean towards authoritarian rule and the ongoing decline of a system designed with checks and balances, surveying Congressional and American history with an eye to detailing the many ways in which various support systems have failed, such as taxation:
The federal tax system is flawed. It imposes higher taxes on wages and interest income while levying fewer taxes on corporations, capital, inherited wealth, and government preferred activities. The federal government taxes work and savings rather than income. As a result, the wealthy accumulate more resources, thereby gaining greater influence over the politicians who decide tax policy. For lower-income individuals, saving money is extremely difficult since all their earnings go towards basic living expenses. To the federal government, the laborer is a commodity that pays taxes.
While much of this won’t be news to already-thinking readers who have historical and social analysis on their radars, the part about how America arrived at where it is today links many seemingly disparate threads of connection and dysfunction to review the shifting tides and forces at work in dissembling democratic processes.
More so than most critical surveys of American political systems, Kovacs creates a close inspection of Congress’s role in all these events, considering the actions of the judicial system, administrative state, and revised frameworks of accountability.
This will give politicians, political science students, and the general public a much broader inspection of political history and choice than the usual approach to government-wide operations, narrowing the onus not just to Congress, but the systems that support its powers.
Libraries that choose Congress: An Irrelevant Institution or Guardian of the Republic for their collections will find this survey enlightening, hard-hitting, and worthy of top recommendation to political discussion groups and anyone interested in American history and politics.
Its focus on precedent, intention, and the constitutional duty of Congress and its processes creates important food for thought certain to fuel many an avid discussion.
Congress: An Irrelevant Institution or Guardian of the RepublicReturn to Index
Daffy:
Laughter as Self-Care for
Autism Moms with Very Little Time and No Interest in Exercise
Andrea
Moriarty
Atmosphere
Press
979-8901741757
$17.99
Paperback; $30.99 Hardcover;
$8.99 ebook
www.atmospherepress.com
Daffy: Laughter as Self-Care for Autism Moms with Very Little Time and No Interest in Exercise, a study in parenting a child with autism, comes from a mother who spent decades juggling twins, autism, and life.
Despite its subtitle reference to laughter, mothers facing the challenge of raising an autistic child may not initially believe there is fun to be had in reading Daffy - but they’d be wrong.
Reflecting the adage that “laughter is the best medicine,” Andrea Moriarty proceeds to invite parents of autistic kids to reflect on their past, present, and futures in a different, unexpected way:
These painful memories accumulated in the pit of my stomach like burnt bits on the surface of a skillet. They’re crusted on, stubborn, and stuck. Recently, I have discovered that laughter is the best way to clean up the result. Like water (or wine), it deglazes the surface of our souls and loosens up this gunk so it can be whooshed down the disposal. Or, better yet, whisked together with a few choice ingredients and transformed into a rich, flavorful sauce you can pour over the whole meal to improve the taste and impress your holiday guests.
Whether its encounters with the medical profession and all kinds of health challenges or the intuitive methods mothers employ to raise their kids, Daffy explores experiences that reinforce a mother’s empowerment and ability to navigate all manner of life challenges:
Some rules were made to be bent. And some doctors, God bless them, trust mothers to bend them. Most of the time, by the way, moms know how and why the cotton ball got stuck up there in the first place. It’s as easy as understanding our child’s babbling before it’s intelligible to others or intuiting what they’re thinking before they say it. After lots of practice, we can also predict their reactions to stimuli.
From life hacks for Christians and spiritual readers to the experiences of other mothers as they move through public and private places with their autistic children, readers receive inviting stories which spark not just laughter, but insight and understanding:
We are so grateful for these “plants,” as in people woven into the fabric of community to influence others. Not spider ivy. When Henry spent a month at an overnight independent living experience designed for his comorbid condition (not his autism), the variables started stacking up. Multiple times, poor Henry got squished in the back row of a van for outings. He’s got long legs, and no one explained why he never got a turn in the front seat. It wasn’t fair, and that offended him most. There were other stressors, like shared bathrooms, someone stealing his razor, and the noise of communal living. These stacked up undetected and unsupported over the course of four months until he flipped out, kicking and screaming in generalized mutiny in front of a restaurant. As his mom tells it, “He found his middle finger.”
The result is unexpectedly inviting and easy to read, capturing the ups, downs, and realities of living with an autistic child of any age while showing how laughter can be part of the solution to a myriad of life challenges.
Librarians seeking a different approach to autism, parenting challenges, or empowerment will find Daffy: Laughter as Self-Care for Autism Moms with Very Little Time and No Interest in Exercise a standout for its joy, reflective scenarios, adulting challenges, and the experiences of “Daffy moms” who find their lives not just challenged, but enlightened by their experiences.
Daffy: Laughter as Self-Care for Autism Moms with Very Little Time and No Interest in ExerciseReturn to Index
The Five
Miracles: The Holy Spirit
Finds Me
Paul
Edwards
Independently
Published
9798233702570
$5.99
Amazon
ordering:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GTBSVVZZ
Apple
ordering:
https://books.apple.com/us/book/the-five-miracles-finding-the-holy-spirit/id6760786134
The Five Miracles: The Holy Spirit Finds Me continues Paul Edwards’s autobiographical journey of spiritual reflection and discovery, a testament to finding faith and better understanding God’s force in life.
These vibrant first-person reflections capture religious thinkers from the story’s opening lines with candid wonder that reflects the process of finding God in all kinds of ways:
"This is... this is me," I breathed, the words catching in my throat with a surge of unexpected joy. "God using me. Not a saint, not a scholar, but me, with all my doubts, my fumbles, and my perfectly ordinary life."
More so than most memoirs about spiritual enlightenment and discovery, Edwards captures the moment-by-moment experiences of feeling and considering God in every decision-making event, moment, and encounter in his life, pairing these revelations with daily reflections that both test and transform:
My gut clenched, a cold knot tightening. A trap! the voice inside shrieked, its rasp a chilling echo of my own ingrained distrust. It whispered of hidden agendas, of open palms waiting to snatch, of being played for a fool. God wouldn't steer me wrong, but this feels... wrong. A desperate, gnawing unease consumed me, the fear that this so-called compassion was merely a cunning disguise for my own gullibility. Part of me yearned to slam the door, to retreat into the predictable safety of my calculated, small offerings.
Confessions and revelations mount, moving in unusual directions to consider unravelings, fate, the terror of Covid, and new ways to live in an age of uncertainty. These test not only survival, but belief. The intimate, revealing nature of these experiences come full circle to make spiritual connections:
When prayer becomes the air you breathe, miracles unfurl. My life, lived through the lens of such extremes, is the greatest miracle of all.
How do people adapt, survive, keep going on, become more cognizant of God’s force in the world, and absorb and reflect His word and intentions? Through such dialogues as will be created in Christian readers who choose The Five Miracles: The Holy Spirit Finds Me to augment their spiritual journeys through life.
Christian libraries interested in memoirs that delve into family, life, and revised values and perceptions will find The Five Miracles: The Holy Spirit Finds Me a powerful adjunct to group discussion and individual reflection alike:
It was then, surrounded by the fragility of life and the immense power of collective prayer, that I understood Grandma's original teaching, the thread woven through every encounter, every subtle nudge. It was a complete circle, a symphony of love, a journey where the Holy Spirit had not merely found me, but where, perhaps, I had been finding Him all along.
Filled with life interactions that lead the author and his readers towards divine realizations, The Five Miracles: The Holy Spirit Finds Me is highly recommended reading for Christians who would better understand how God works in daily affairs, and how human beings connect the dots to realize His presence and value in their choices and progression.
The Five Miracles: The Holy Spirit Finds MeReturn to Index
Getting
to Better
Stephen
de Groot
Networlding
Publishing
978-1959993599
$19.97
Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Getting-Better-Model-Elevating-Potential/dp/1959993593
Getting To Better: A New Model for Elevating Human Potential at Work and in Life, a template for change, advocates that everyone can be a better leader. It introduces the CORE Algorithm, a picture of what human betterment looks like translated into practical strategies anyone can adopt to push their lives and goals forward.
The premise is simple, addressing the common obstacles to achievement and the process of becoming stuck and unstuck, translating what humans can do to be and feel better into a CORE formula anyone can easily apply.
Take the concept of “resilience,” for one example. While most believe this applies to conditions of crisis, Stephen de Groot maintains that resilience can be expanded to a wider range of life situations:
Resilience is our everyday human strength in action. Think about it. Whether we're talking about functioning well, performing at our best, or coping with stress, it all comes down to behavior. It's the sum of our actions, inactions, and interactions. If we only label this strength "resilience" after a crisis, we miss its true nature. Resilience is happening right now.
Links are drawn between childhood and adult experiences and goals, revised methods of viewing and achieving desires and milestones, and the process of adaptation and leadership which accompanies revised realizations:
The need to be truly seen isn't exclusive to childhood. This fundamental human desire, established early in life, stays with us forever. Regardless of who you are or how old you are, one truth remains constant: when you feel seen, heard, and understood – when your relationships and environments are consistently nurturing, encouraging, and supportive – your ability to thrive is amplified, even in the most challenging situations.
This lends to new approaches to not just leadership, but life. These embrace newfound connections between intension and action through such techniques as active listening, addressing individual and team patterns of belief, and changing dialogues and approaches for more effective results.
The insights on motivation and communication are priceless as the guide evolves new possibilities through examples and revised approaches.
Libraries seeking self-help books that can expand beyond business and leadership milieus will find Getting To Better: A New Model for Elevating Human Potential at Work and in Life especially highly recommendable to book clubs, reading groups, and individuals interested in self-motivation and change.
Packed with important links between life events, relationships, and new possibilities, Getting To Better: A New Model for Elevating Human Potential at Work and in Life will delight readers seeking effective guidelines for self-improvement that operates on more than one level.
Getting to BetterReturn to Index
Good
Humans Make Great Leaders
Jody
Fletcher
GFB
978-1-967510-50-4
$8.99 eBook
www.girlfridayproductions.com
Retired Commander Master Chief, US Navy author Jody Fletcher’s Good Humans Make Great Leaders: Inspiring Others Begins With You surveys the basics of aspiring to and becoming not just a good leader, but a great one. It identifies the rudiments of first becoming a good human being, before considering a leadership role.
This connection between the two is essential for readers who acknowledge a difference between leaders who embark upon goal-setting for others without putting their own psyches and houses in order first and those who enter into a leadership role from a foundation of self-empowerment and insight.
Jody Fletcher has his own dreams for the ultimate use of his book – which may preclude library lending, or demand that a patron obtain their own copy:
This book is meant to make you consider what it means to be a better human and leader, and like life itself, that will leave some marks! In other words, this is not a book to read and then stick on a shelf as a Zoom backdrop. I want it to be full of notes, highlighted like a toddler got ahold of the markers, with dog-eared pages, Post-it flags standing out like you just landed on the moon, and, of course, ample coffee stains.
Fletcher identifies spaces where potentially good people can get stuck, such as the “Woe Space,” admonishing:
...good humans don’t waste time in victim space. When they find themselves there, they find their way back out, quick!
It takes awareness, savvy, and attention to detail to become a “good human,” and therefore a good leader. Fletcher offers a host of techniques for evolutionary success, using his own life as a template for understanding and growth:
Some of the best leadership lessons you’ll learn along the way are when you fail and grind the gears. Remember to push in the clutch, pause to assess and identify lessons learned, and shift into the right gear. The lesson I learned was the importance of psychological safety and how it directly relates to advocacy.
The result is a study in transformation that, more so than most leadership guides, focuses on changing oneself first before stepping into the role of guiding others.
This is why librarians will want to highly recommend Good Humans Make Great Leaders to a wide audience of business leaders, entrepreneurs, political activists, and virtually anyone who would work on themselves before embarking on a life-changing mission to interact with others.
The book’s focus on objectives, assumptions, and realities makes it a winner worthy of book club and reading group discussions.
Good Humans Make Great LeadersReturn to Index
I Live
You Forever
Meredith
Rutter Marple
Atmosphere
Press
979-8-90174-014-9
$8.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Live-You-Ever-Dementia-Marriage-ebook/dp/B0GQZ71XYL
I Live You For Ever: Dementia in a Loving Marriage chronicles nine years of lovingly living with a spouse’s dementia, and is drawn from personal journals Meredith Rutter Marple kept during the experience. As such, its intention is to capture the immediacy of dementia and “to give you a gut feeling for how our life morphed as we encountered his illness and lost our freedoms.”
Unlike most look-backs at chronic conditions, Marple’s journals captured conversations and experiences as they were happening. Nothing has been embellished or re-imagined, making this true story much more impactful than most ... sensitive readers, beware.
That said, much is to be absorbed from the daily trials and movement of time captured within these pages – more so than the usual account of living with dementia and decline.
Perhaps most striking is the outline of freedoms taken for granted and lost during the process of continual adjustment and fluctuation, which outlines many dilemmas readers won’t expect:
It seems to me that digital technology has increased the difficulty of dealing with dementia in its transition stages. When a person has been oriented to computers and now needs help living his life with those tools, even as he’s forgetting how to use them, you can’t just say no, stop using those tools. At least, I don’t think a spouse can say that—or not this spouse.
From handling shifts between “old Gary” and new situations to navigating daily challenges, Marple’s outline of living with dementia not only reviews her experiences, but imparts coping strategies key to understanding and adaptation:
Once home and settled with our separate projects, it’s only a few minutes before I hear, “Meredith? Come here. I’m making a book.” I go over and ooh and aah about his plans, not really understanding them. Then he says, “I need the paper cutter.” He leaves for the back room. I can’t imagine what he’s envisioning. I turn to addressing holiday cards and soon notice it’s been quiet too long in the back room. I’m not hearing paper cutter sounds and I’m not hearing the copier, two skills he still possesses.
These insights make I Live You For Ever especially thought-provoking and attractive to anyone embarking on a similar journey. Most of all, it displays how love is maintained and retained in the face of vast changes – an effort which could prove a near-impossibility without the guidance and experiences outlined in this book.
This is why librarians and readers need to place I Live You For Ever ahead of many others about dementia. It’s both a “you are here” guide to daily interactions and regular adjustments and a blueprint for preserving love against all odds that offers rare glimpses into the process by which a marriage adapts, but retains its foundation of love.
Marple’s effort is brilliant, tear-inducing, and thought-provoking, all in one.
I Live You ForeverReturn to Index
The Land
of Everlasting Sky
Jill D.
Swenson
She
Writes Press
979-8-89636-318-7
$17.99
Paperback/$12.99 eBook
https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-land-of-everlasting-sky-a-memoir-of-loss-and-legacy-on-lake-of-the-woods-jill-d-swenson/cb8a9b7d8108f41e
The Land of Everlasting Sky: A Memoir of Loss and Legacy on Lake of the Woods is a memoir steeped in contemporary First Nations affairs, friendship, issues of land usage and heritage, and history that takes Jill D. Swenson’s grief and gives it new direction.
Readers interested in any or all of these topics will find it a powerfully evocative discourse on race, culture, and personal empowerment which weaves together a seemingly disparate set of values and observations, creating a narrative powerfully impactful in its tone and approach to life:
The bonfires and stories of Indian lore, the legacy of Leopold, listening to the loons at night, waking to the wild screech of herons, identifying wildflower species, hiking geological formations, re-creating a fish habitat, transforming minds and bodies with good hard work, and swimming and bathing in the small gorges of spring-fed creeks. What romantic notions I entertained about the nobility of my work.
Why wasn’t I held accountable for the damages to vehicles? I don’t recall feeling any sense of responsibility for those mistakes. To be young, female, and white in Wisconsin.
As Swenson struggles with loss and grief and a growing, unexpected community which emerges from it, she also discovers issues about inheritance, casino development and land usage, surprising political legacies that resonate into the choices and lifestyles of future generations, and more.
Swenson’s surveys swing strongly from the political to the personal, drawing deep connections:
I had believed back then that I had deserved it. The victimization. The trauma. The drama. Without Dad playing that role in my life, I found Reggie to replace him. Even though I’d let myself fall head over heels with someone as different from my own father as I could possibly imagine, I’d accepted a dynamic even more toxic and dysfunctional.
These create a dynamic, volatile story that proves the epitome of the fine line between personal and community connection and experience, illustrating how a memoir steeped in new revelations for self can translate to bigger-picture thinking about all kinds of life encounters.
The insights about how prejudice and bigotry erase not only individuals, but entire cultures, are particularly hard-hitting and poignant when couched in personal reflection and encounters as described in The Land of Everlasting Sky.
All these reasons are why The Land of Everlasting Sky should be an essential library addition to any library strong in Native American history, culture, and memoirs.
Packed with an outstanding weaving of personal and political affairs, The Land of Everlasting Sky offers lessons and insights rarely seen elsewhere, drawing all kinds of readers into its evocative discussions.
The Land of Everlasting SkyReturn to Index
Love in
Their Hearts
Marc
Bekoff & Jeff Campbell
Armin
Lear Press
978-1-968919-30-6
$24.95
https://www.amazon.com/Love-Their-Hearts-Celebration-Compassionate/dp/1968919309
While some may be tempted to consider this a collection of “animal stories,” in fact Love in Their Hearts: A Celebration of Animal Emotions and a Guide to Compassionate Action is so much more, guiding readers on the topics of animal observation, emotional connection, and animal activism. It offers an exciting survey for readers interested in animal behavior, whether they come from scientific or general interest backgrounds, taking a deep dive not only into research, but the interconnectedness of humans and their subjects:
Dolphin researcher Maddalena Bearzi says, when something unexpected or extraordinary happens, “I put my dry scientific objectivity on hold in favor of the empathy of the moment.”
Each animal story embodies an emotional connection and response which will not just delight and warm readers who love animals, but often surprise them.
From play behavior exhibited in various species to the researcher’s mandate to dig deeper into its incarnations and meaning, Love in Their Hearts considers many aspects of behavioral observation:
Dogs invite play by creeping forward on their stomach, tail wagging. They sometimes engage in play pants (or rapid breathing). Some species even have play scents. Research has found that a species of voles emits a pheromone from the back of their heads that stimulates play in other voles. Dogs and other animals might have the same thing, but we don’t know yet. The contagious joy of play is perhaps the most recognizable sign. Still, it’s important to remember that identifying emotions is much easier than understanding the how and why of animal behavior. To correctly interpret the complex interactions and social behaviors involved in an expression of joy requires training, experience, and research.
This provides as much insight into the nature and special challenges of animal behavior research as it does the process of documenting and understanding these exhibitions of emotion.
Animals wild and domestic are considered, but the survey doesn’t stop with identifying their patterns and behaviors. It embraces the concept of how humans can improve animal lives through different choices based on better understanding.
Ultimately, Love in Their Hearts teaches how to live with animals in a more cognizant, informed manner that can ripple into all kinds of situations and purposes.
Libraries and readers will find Love in Their Hearts a powerful attraction whether because of its research, its animal vignettes, its human interactions and discussions of choice, or its diverse descriptions of magpies, dogs, dolphins, foxes, and concerns about zoos and captivity.
Love in Their Hearts ideally will be chosen for book club and reading group discussion among animal behavior researchers and general-interest readers alike. Its insights on behaviors and, more importantly, human responses are invaluable first steps towards effecting positive change and building better relationships – not just between animals and humans, but between human beings.
Love in Their HeartsReturn to Index
“Meeting”
Anne Frank: An
Anthology, 2nd Edition
Tim
Whittome, Editor
Independently
Published
9798369448809
$58.99
Hardcover/$47.69 Paperback/$9.99
eBook
https://a.co/d/04ULgYz9
The revised, updated second edition of “Meeting” Anne Frank: An Anthology is a key acquisition for libraries interested in Anne Frank history, appearing in full color to support the collection of personal stories and insights about Anne with a visual strength that gives the book further depth. The inclusion of additional essays by Anne Talvaz, Joy Gafà, and Priscilla Smits which were inspired by the author’s trip to Amsterdam, further broadens the perceptions, insights, and experiences of Anne Frank for audiences interested in how the young girl’s life continues to impact generations who never met her.
Why a second edition? The inclusion of powerful, hard-hitting color images would have been enough justification for this reprint, but augmenting these images are further reflections and information that stemmed from editor Tim Whittome’s research, which led him to desire “to include more of my reflections on not just the lives and legacies of Anne and Margot Frank as teenage victims of the Holocaust but also on the wider impact of the Nazi occupation on the Dutch following the German invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940. I have drawn impressions and reflections from having read over fifty new memoirs, histories, and other critical studies since I first edited “Meeting” Anne for eventual publication in 2021.”
Given his expanded studies and focus, the second edition of “Meeting” Anne Frank: An Anthology represents a true value in its wider-ranging inclusion and consideration of the forces that Anne’s presence in the world created, which continue to resonate in many unexpected ways today.
Chapters come from many thinkers and social engagers, including Italian charity founder Federica Pannocchia, who reflects:
One of my favorite quotes of Anne Frank is, “How wonderful it is that no one has to wait, but can start right now to gradually change the world!”158 And I do believe that this quote has become my motto. In my organization, we also focus on children in need and actual issues like migrants and refugees. We focus on all those people who are still discriminated against today.
We can choose what to do with our lives, how to react. We can choose to love and not to hate.
We can choose to live and to help.
We can choose to start to improve our world.
Each essay takes a segment of Anne’s lasting influence and writing and places it in a perspective and place that most readers won’t expect. This, in turn, creates a joyful expansion of Frank’s impact on future generations that readers will find ultimately hopeful and uplifting – perfect panaceas for modern times, and wonderful instructions for how to not just survive, but thrive.
This is why libraries will want to consider this second edition an essential acquisition – especially those that may have purchased the prior, more limited edition and have seen its popularity among patrons and reading groups.
Packed with extraordinary insights into Frank’s lasting legacy, the second edition of “Meeting” Anne Frank: An Anthology is a powerful celebration not to be missed.
“Meeting” Anne Frank: An Anthology, 2nd EditionReturn to Index
Murder
to Movies
Paul
Drexler
Independently
Published
979-8-9944234-1-7
Price: $19.95
Website/ordering
link: https://www.amazon.com/Murder-Movies-Story-Hollywoods-Darkest/dp/B0GQBHD82Q/
Murder to Movies: The Real Story Behind Hollywood’s Darkest Filmsconnects Hollywood movies to true crime, analyzing selected films and their production. Included in the mix are such disparate crime scenes as James Cagney’s inspiration for “White Heat,” where his defiant stand is based on real-world events:
Cagney is the ultimate rebel, an iconic figure, surrounded by hundreds of armed men. He is without fear, a man with nothing to lose. His last ace is his willingness, his eagerness to kill, and to die. But the lines Cagney speaks are not from the mind of a screenwriter. They are from the mouths of Francis Crowley and Augie Robles, two killers, whose lives played out 30 years apart, in barricaded New York City apartments, accompanied by the sound of bullets, the smell of teargas, the angered determination of police, and the excited chatter of tens of thousands of bystanders. Francis Crowley was a real-life version of the short, cocky Irish gangster character that James Cagney often played in his career.
The discussions of real-world figures that influenced movie themes, actors, and the psychology of criminal behavior create important insights into not just movie-making and criminal history, but also how psychology is injected into plots and the relationship between real events and the movies based on them.
Paul Drexler does not limit his analysis to either a movie or an actor. He expands the theme to consider a wide range of real-world crime, from Sada Abe, the most notorious murderer in Japan’s history, to the California Zodiac Killer, to Barbara Graham, whose gas chamber execution ignited opposition to capital punishment.
Readers receive much more than a film synopsis and will appreciate the important connections that emerge between the minds of killers and their portrayal and analysis in film.
This will intrigue filmmakers, social historians, true crime readers, and a wide range of general-interest readers interested in how films are conceived, crime interpreted and presented, and vibes created that draw viewers into the nature and dark concepts of all kinds of crime.
Ideally, Murder to Movies will not just accompany a library’s film collection but be chosen for book club debate and classroom discussion on a range of subjects, from filmmaking responsibility and interpretive license to the psychology of criminals and the public viewers interested in their lives, motivations, and methods.
Packed with unexpected and lively connections between film portrayals and real-life events, Murder to Movies will especially delight film buffs who have seen these movies but not thought about them in such depth, or in such a manner.
Murder to MoviesReturn to Index
Necromancers
and Navy Grog
Melissa
Jacobson
Blackridge
Publishing LLC
979-8-9925139-5-0
$14.99 paperback/$4.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Necromancers-Navy-Grog-Bad-Magic-ebook/dp/B0GSX1MV1C
Necromancers and Navy Grog is a paranormal fantasy thriller steeped in San Francisco’s atmosphere:
The morning fog burns away as we crest the hill on Third Street, the bay and the wharf spread out before us. Masts of the ships crowding San Francisco Bay poke through the mist like the bare bones of dead leviathans in the distance.
Female protagonist Mary Catherine (Mick)and her partner Loosh (Agent Aloysious Temple), members of the Anti Death Magic Division of the Bureau of Magical Investigation, are on a mission, chasing ghost sightings which most likely will prove to be a prank.
They aren’t.
Agent Mick Kelly also possesses the gift of Gleaning (the ability to absorb supernatural power from dying souls), but falls on hard times when her partner is killed and she is suspended from the agency. Alone, she determines to confront her shifting world. The action moves from docks to museums and legendary actions to her evolving friendship with Gold Tooth Mary, a crime boss who can help Mick find her missing young apprentice.
As Gold Tooth Mary confronts a Gleaner thirsty for death and considers her own mortality, her own innate talents inject new quandries into her confrontation of forces of magical corruption, political might, and personal empowerment in the magic-infused city.
As events coalesce around a missing relic, a vanished boy, and two women whose lives entwine in unexpected, magical ways, readers are treated to a supernatural thriller replete with diverse, strong characters whose special interests converge.
Mary seeks protection from revenants; Mick seeks redemption and answers. Their conjoined purposes create a story richly packed with political connections which are intriguing and exciting:
“How many federal agents do you think are stationed in San Francisco? Five? Maybe ten with that new task force? Now consider how many regular police patrol these streets. Perhaps three hundred on a good day, for a city of half a million if you count the transients?” Her gold tooth twinkles. “They can’t be everywhere. They focus on the threats that matter, anything that might make the newspapers. A little market where desperate souls buy harmless charms and potions?” She shrugs. “That’s just commerce.”
The result is a fine book in the Bad Magic Historical Fantasy Series that excels with many gripping moments, powerful female characters, magical displays and confrontations, and insights into how far each individual will go in pursuit of what they value the most in their lives.
Filled with fast-paced action powered by these strong women and a realistic San Francisco backdrop, Necromancers and Navy Grog is highly recommended reading for fantasy, thriller, and paranormal genre readers alike.
Its ability to depict several realistic characters whose purposes and life examinations feel especially realistic and rich despite the fantasy influences that direct their lives makes Necromancers and Navy Grog a top recommendation for libraries looking for crossover titles that hold the capacity to appeal to an especially wide audience.
Necromancers and Navy GrogReturn to Index
Nobody’s
Daughter
Jan Keyes
Magic
Dog Press, LLC
9798295517570
$19.99 Paperback/$9.99
eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Nobodys-Daughter-My-Quest-Family/dp/B0GT3Z3TN5
Nobody's
Daughter: My Quest for a
Family is a work of creative nonfiction by author
Jan Keyes’
which offers a portrait based of her life from when she becomes a
ward of the state at age eight. Through child's eyes, she vividly
portrays her family's maltreatment of her, the terror of being
in institutions and in foster care, and how those experiences
affected her life and the reality of not belonging to anyone.
The
memoir opens with an attempted
suicide of her as a desolate, single young mother. The book’s theme
reveals itself when Jan changes course, realizing she must remain
alive in order to care for her daughter, and so chooses not to end
her life. She then resolves to step up to her parental
responsibilities, which are in stark contrast to her own mother who
left her locked in a detention facility as a ward of the state - the
cause of losing her own family. (In this preface, she recalls how she
felt after her mother abandoned her, reliving the terrorizing memory
detailed in Chapter 3.)
Remarkably,
Jan took back her life from
the state and lived on her own at sixteen; but by nineteen she had a
baby of her own to care for. The journey that follows reflects
her fervent desire to create a sense of normalcy for her daughter as
she tries to give her daughter what she never had.
Especially
poignant are the encounters
she faces along the way, including attempts at making a family with
foster parents who prove mercurial in their perceptions of the role
foster children should assume in their lives.
More so
than most accounts of foster
children, family, adoption, and survival, Nobody's
Daughter:
My Quest for a Family offers the potential for
greater
understanding about family origins, decisions, and the impact of
being a foster child wanted by nobody. Its personal reflections and
assessments introduce valuable insights to foster parents, adoptive
parents, and other surrogates called upon to assume family roles.
Another
unique aspect of the story lies
in the challenge of tackling motherhood without having the experience
of what a "normal" family is. She compensates by engaging
with other in-tact families for meaningful family experiences for
herself and her daughter.
As she
matures, Keyes looks for
opportunities to build her career, and, during the social revolution
of the 60s-70s, she learns to grow spiritually and emotionally, by
developing a positive outlook. She unburdens from her past by
allowing herself to forgive those who have mistreated her. In Chapter
30, “You create your own reality,” becomes her
mantra.
This may offer hope and inspiration to many burdened by similar
childhood traumas.
The jump
from being a foster child,
experiencing homelessness, and living in a detention facility to
constructing new paradigms for family and love, nearly from scratch,
makes Nobody's Daughter a vivid
story of overcoming
nearly impossible odds to succeed not just as a parent, but as an
entrepreneur, wife, and well-rounded individual.
Keyes
navigates a host of questions and
possibilities surrounding her own tumultuous childhood and her impact
on a future generation, reviewing issues common to parents and
families both intact and struggling. These, in turn, will lead to
avid book club discussions in a wide group of readers, from parenting
circles to psychology students and family social workers, child
welfare policymakers, and researchers documenting the psychological
and social impacts of foster care on society.
This
topic and Keyes’s treatment of
it holds a LOT of potential audience interest, and is more diverse
than usual, in this respect.
Libraries
that choose Nobody's
Daughter: My Quest for a Family for their
collections will
want to very highly recommend the saga for its powerful inspections
of family concepts, creation, interactions, and choices. The story’s
ability to delve into the heart of relationship-building, family
adversity, and intentional community make its wide-ranging
considerations of equally broad interest, all delivered with a vivid
attention to detail and analysis of family ties that will shake even
the firmest foundation of readers who believed they knew what family
bonds entailed.
Return to Index
The
Perfect Kingdom
Lily
Corsello
Independently
Published
979-8986143248
Price:
$15.99 (paperback), $5.99
(ebook)
Ordering: https://a.co/d/077w8pUU
Christian readers of dystopian fiction will find The Perfect Kingdom’s special blend of faith-based plot and survival story just the ticket for absorbing a future world in which the new Millennial age means that hundred-year-old baby Hassadah is still just a little girl. Ben and Ruth can now enjoy extended time with their family. But is this a blessing, or something different?
Lily Corsello raises this and other questions as family life and a peaceful Millennial morning open the story with a church visit and reflection on life’s blessings ... when disaster strikes. What was to be a day of hope and connection among church members turns into a grief-laden day in the Millennial Kingdom in a turn of events that is the first to spark discord in paradise.
Christian readers will readily recognize the shaken faith and questions which arise from these events:
“Is this the Lord God we serve? Do you see what’s happening to us? How could He allow this now—after keeping us through the worst period of history?”
They will also appreciate how Ruth and her family come to not just question, but reflect on deeper meanings of faith and connection which arise from unexpected adversity and life-changing moments.
Is an outside force trying to attack the family’s foundations? As family and church face a long recovery, many questions, and rough physical and spiritual moments, readers are brought into a world which deviates from planned perfection into realms of religious inspection. Questions buffet not just this family, but Christian readers who have struggled with their own reactions to unexpected life changes.
As Ruth’s journey, The Rebellion, and other forces coalesce, a thoroughly engrossing story examining perfection, faith, tradition, and new world opportunities emerges to delight readers of dystopian fiction seeking a spiritual component in their reading.
Christian libraries will find The Perfect Kingdom an engrossing, winning story of an ultimate struggle between good and evil which begins with one family’s challenges and moves into the greater world to reflect how individual choice and consequences resonate through all levels of society.
Packed with reflective moments, The Perfect Kingdom is recommended for Christian readers and reading groups interested in the intersection between sci-fi, faith, and social and spiritual examination.
The Perfect KingdomReturn to Index
Re-Imagining
Heaven: Just
When You Thought You Understood Heaven
Dr. Art
McNeese
Art
McNeese
979-8266361560
Paperback:
$9.99/Hardcover:
$12.50/Kindle: $2.99
Website http://www.artmcneese.com
Ordering:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GWR6HGTX
Re-Imagining Heaven: Just When You Thought You Understood Heaven is a discourse on heaven that offers new inspection of traditional concepts. Under Dr. McNeese’s hand, the concept of heaven assumes many different possibilities – one of which is the notion that humans won’t go up to heaven; but heaven will come down to meet us.
Others have presented this notion, but what makes Dr. McNeese’s treatise stand out is its attention to pairing personal choice, life values, and spiritual objectives with what will possibly happen when God comes down to Earth and changes everything.
This solemn subject takes the form of unexpected vignettes tying human experience with nature and higher-level thinking about empowerment, Christ, and the concept of end times. Readers may not expect the down-home feel of some of these stories, but they each hold important lessons that prove far more accessible than the lofty discussions that typically occupy religious discourses:
We had some plumbing problems that led me to shut off the water at the base of the toilet the night before. That crafty squirrel had slipped down a rooftop pipe and found its way into the toilet, spending the night in porcelain purgatory. The moment I lifted the lid, it made its break for freedom—straight into the tub! When I shared this saga at church the next Sunday, I’m pretty sure some folks avoided their bathrooms for days. I know it’s a goofy story, but it carries a deeper truth. The squirrel’s wild panic came from being trapped in a place it was never meant to be. It yearned for the open air, its true home, where it could dash around and explore without fear.
Accessibility and insight walk hand in hand in the many discussions in this book, which each offer lively connections between human perceptions and affairs and religious thinking:
Heaven is not a place of discrimination, but it is a place of distinction. Some will have greater responsibilities or greater opportunities to participate in God’s work on the new heaven and new earth. That’s hard for us, because we’re so self-centered, anytime there’s a difference, we turn it into a division. But when God hands out the rewards, it won’t be about you, it will be about Jesus.
Ideally, Re-Imaginging Heaven will assume its place in spiritual circles consisting of book clubs, discussion groups, and Christian church meetings. Its important connections between life experiences, choices, consequences, and Christian ideals are unparalleled, setting the approach, if not the conclusions, of this book apart from most.
Christian library collections and religious readers won’t want to miss the opportunity presented and encouraged by these vignettes to delve deeper into not just the concept of heaven, but its place on Earth and in earthly affairs. People tend to believe these are human-centric when they should ideally involve absorbing and understanding God’s greater intentions and purposes.
Re-Imagining Heaven: Just When You Thought You Understood HeavenReturn to Index
Retire
Widowed
Terri
McGray, CFP, AIF
Precocity
Press
979-8-9931150-2-3
$19.95
Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Retire-Widowed-Reclaiming-Retirement-Security/dp/B0GT54QWTF
Retire Widowed: Reclaiming Retirement Security and Peace of Mind After Loss covers a topic seldom discussed in books about retirement or bereavement - what happens when a spouse passes before or shortly after retirement.
The focus on navigating retirement after loss delves into emotional, financial, and social challenges peculiar to the newly retired widow, considering how retirement is changed by this event, and how a new widow can plan for a single future.
From updating an estate plan and revising financial projections to handling retirement challenges alone, Retire Widowed offers gentle guidance into a host of revised situations many newly widowed individuals might not have begun to comprehend:
Your life has changed in significant ways, and your financial plan needs to reflect that. What once worked for you as part of a couple may no longer apply. Now, your financial plan needs to be designed around your needs, your goals, and your comfort level as a single person. This may involve re-evaluating several key areas.
Newly bereaved retirees need this book. Its mix of practical financial information, necessary revisions, and emotional support gives voice to many underlying assumptions and precedents most books about widowhood don’t tackle.
Even more importantly, Retire Widowed tailors the vision of retirement to a new reality – that of a newly single person – and informs readers what they need to do to make life work again across many levels.
The result is a powerful survey that admonishes, teaches, gently supports, and offers rationales for these important reflections and revisions:
You have spent a lifetime building what you have. You’ve earned the right to protect it properly, and with care, intention, and dignity. Completing this work is not just about legal compliance. It is an act of love toward yourself and those you will one day leave behind.
Librarians will find Retire Widowed unparalleled in its scope, contents, and practical applications, making it a ‘must’ for health, general-interest, and reference collections.
Retire WidowedReturn to Index
Road
Journals 2006-2007: 48 States
By Motorcycle
Woodrow
“Pack” Landfair
Harbinger
Book Group
978-1-940500-03-4
$30.00
Website:
www.PackmanSurfsTheWorld.com
Ordering:
www.amazon.com
When a back injury sidelined professional baseball player Woodrow “Pack” Landfair, he didn’t just sit on the bench cheering the team. He sold nearly everything he owned to buy a motorcycle and embark on the road trip of a lifetime.
Road Journals 2006-2007: 48 States By Motorcycle follows this journey with vignettes of his experiences week by week as he addresses the basics of learning how to ride a motorcycle, then embarks on a series of life lessons and encounters. These lead him in unexpected directions – including full circle.
The endeavor, undertaken in Landfair’s early twenties, opens with a reflection of how others his age are already on roads to different objectives and futures while he has “outgrown my previous self”:
I thought of all my friends all over the globe doing so many things. Some of them were pitching in the major leagues. Some of them were doing drugs just blocks away. Some of my friends were in law school, some were mowing lawns, and a handful of them were half a continent and one ocean away fighting a war in the Middle East.
His journey of personal growth chronicles a series of forays into others’ lives which skirt the edges of social norms. He captures conversations and reflections about American society that are rarely presented in print, offering insights that contribute to his shifting values and objectives, as with an encounter with homeless men at Thanksgiving:
I listened to conversations around the dinner tables. Some of the homeless men were talking about books they’d recently read. Others were talking about where to find jobs. One homeless man, a tall guy with black matted-down hair, was telling a group that working everyday wasn’t worth it. “What’s it gonna do?” He asked. “We’re all gonna die. So you go to work, sit in that office for 50 or 70 hours a week and what do ya got? A nice car that takes you ten years to pay off ? A nice house where ya gotta pay the mortgage the rest of your life?” Some of the men at his table nodded. Some shook their heads. “I say, it’s just not for me. My freedom’s not worth that. This system doesn’t make sense to me.”
The most notable achievement Landfair makes in his memoir lies in vivid reflections about the ultimate impact of America’s diversity and his encounters with all kinds of people, which change his attitude and life:
I had left Texas as a peon, entered New York City like a plebe. Somewhere in between New York and here, I’d gathered the strength of all the million-toone shots that formed this nation. I’d slammed them inside of me and now stood on the mountain top of the Arkansas-Oklahoma border facing the west of my future, abandoning the east of my past.
The process by which he embraces, absorbs, and reflects all these lives and encounters to revise his psyche and future will prompt many discussions among book clubs, fellow travelers, self-help readers interested in the wellsprings of growth, and audiences intrigued by road trips that prove transformational.
Librarians and readers choosing Road Journals 2006-2007: 48 States By Motorcycle will find it an outstanding example of just what can be achieved when experience and reflection meld in a journey far from familiar territory and social expectations.
Packed with vivid color and sizzling descriptions, Road Journals 2006-2007: 48 States By Motorcycle is much more than another travelogue of nomadic experience. It’s ultimately a deep dive into the roots of growth that will encourage many a reader to reconsider their life trajectory and undertake their own paradigm-changing journeys.
Road Journals 2006-2007: 48 States By MotorcycleReturn to Index
Sleeping
With the Enemy
Edouard
Prisse
Independently
Published
979-8253362686
Paperback -
$16.99 | Kindle - $2.99
Website: https://edouardprisse.net/
Ordering: https://www.amazon.com/Sleeping-Enemy-White-House-Misses/dp/B0GTZRND3C
Sleeping With the Enemy comes from an independent European political observer who analyzes the relationship between Trump, America, and China. It offers a close inspection of the policies between these countries past and present, considering imports and exports, how China uses the money from trade, and imbalances in the existing trade system.
Even more pointed are observations about the political and psychological influences on Beijing, Taiwan, Europe, Russia and America. These delve into conjoined interests and Chinese patterns of aggression, considering the financial powers China wields, which the average American may not realize:
In our daily lives, we do not yet feel the financial power that China already wields. Many people, therefore, have a healthy skepticism about this power. Is this not being exaggerated? That is a legitimate question. So, allow me to put things in perspective...
Readers interested in the China/US relationship could not have a better overview of the situation. Edouard Prisse considers all kinds of relationships between the countries and their changing leaders, contrasting political thinking with past and present precedents and actions to lay a historical foundation for understanding both nations today.
Even more importantly, Prisse delves into specifics about free trade and restriction that give additional value for those who would better understand the motivations and influences of each nation:
These Chinese attitudes and methods have a significant negative impact on our economies, but they still pose a far lesser threat than the massive enrichment from free trade.
From policies to missteps and successes, warning signs of danger and the actions of elite influences, and the risks of China’s expanding powers, Prisse provides the kind of reasoned analysis that might only have come from an observer outside the U.S. with inside information on the actions and choices of both nations.
Librarians seeking a multidisciplinary observer’s narrowed focus on the governing practice of political relationships with China and its underlying threat will find Sleeping With the Enemy a powerful survey. It’s worthy of recommendation to book clubs, political science readers, and especially any group interested in China’s policies, processes, and interactions with the world.
Sleeping With the EnemyReturn to Index
The
Successful Man
Kenneth
G. Alexander
Desert
Sky Press
979-8-9908088-2-9
$24.99
Hardcover/$19.99 Paperback/$7.99
eBook
www.Desertsky.press
The Successful Man: A New Vision of Masculinity surveys the landscape of male success and masculinity with an eye to revising its standards and perception, giving readers a new interpretation of male value and its traditionally high costs.
What does it mean to be a man, how is maleness defined, and how can ambition be redefined through newfound emotional connections? These and other questions hold answers in The Successful Man which not only consider the nature of masculinity, but success.
Chapters address the emotional components of “success” in a new light which will engage, intrigue, and delight many a reader no matter their sex:
When we’re taught that some people are superior, that difference is dangerous, or that dominance equals safety, those beliefs seep into every interaction. They become the lens through which we judge others, and the cage that limits our own growth. And this is where it connects back to success and masculinity. The same beliefs that taught us who’s “above” or “below” also taught us what a “successful man” is supposed to be. They linked worth to money, strength to emotional shutdown, leadership to control, and manhood to performance.
These critical inspections of the costs of manhood’s values will prove not just enlightening, but important to relationships, growth, leadership, and social engagements men often find challenging.
From duty and love to connections made and broken and revised definitions of “successful,” Kenneth G. Alexander’s dialogues and connections should form the foundation of any men’s group discussion, should be in every general lending library, and should be gifted to men interested in considering the definition and cost of masculinity.
Librarians that choose The Successful Man for their collections will be especially pleased by Alexander’s powerful, appealing mandate for effecting positive, lasting change:
This is the invitation: not just to rethink manhood, but to live it differently, every day, in every choice, in every relationship.
The Successful ManReturn to Index
Superstars’
Weight Loss Secrets
José
Silva and Ed Bernd Jr.
G&D
Media
9781722507688
$14.95
Paperback/$9.98 eBook/$19.99
eAudiobook
https://indiepubs.com/products/silva-superstars-weight-loss-secrets-9781722507688
Superstars’ Weight Loss Secrets shares the promise that the subconscious mind can act as a catalyst for weight loss by incorporating the basic message “eat less and move more” into daily routines that can prove instinctive rather than an effort.
José Silva’s Superstars Weight Loss System is designed to do just that: make connections between food and exercise automatic, to the point that they are part of daily life rather than an addendum to one’s routines.
Unlike most weight loss books, this involves employing the mind towards better, actionable results. Silva’s mind methods are a foundation of this process, but prior familiarity with them isn’t a requirement for newcomers who choose this book with weight loss in mind.
Chapters review programming (and reprogramming), mental exercises, better understanding and employing mind/body connections for optimal results in weight management, and using relaxation, centering, and purposeful mental exercises to aid in the motivation process.
These differ from most approaches to weight loss in that they embrace a holistic connection between thought and action that empowers readers to adopt strategies, perceptions, and support systems stemming from their own mental abilities.
Silva’s step-by-step exercises are easy to follow - but they do require that readers commit to following directions, apply the training, and believe in its effectiveness:
We will now impress and program Habit Control, mental techniques you can use to control the eating habit and reduce your weight to your ideal weight. When you decide to reduce weight, enter level 1 by the use of the 3 to 1 method and analyze your weight problem. At level 1, mentally mark a big red “No” over every item of food considered to be causing the problem. Program yourself that hunger between meals will vanish by eating a piece of carrot, celery, or apple, or some such helpful foods, or by taking three deep breaths. Program yourself to leave something on your plate, realizing that you do not need all the food you have taken. Program yourself not to eat dessert.
The result ties the Silva Method to concrete, achievable weight loss results for those that hold the mental discipline and open-mindedness to embed these routines into their daily lives.
Support comes from website and additional systems that further understanding and training:
If you are using the Silva Centering Exercise (also known as the Long Relaxation Exercise) on the SilvaNow.com website to enter the alpha level, then you can skip the information that follows.
The result is not an idealistic view of weight loss, but a mental strategy that employs the Silva Method in a concrete manner to address a very common problem.
Weight loss efforts will be enhanced by these routines, while librarians seeing interest in the other Silva books (or who want alternative weight loss guides and approaches) will find Superstars’ Weight Loss Secrets an intriguing, different choice that deserves recommendation, especially among health and self-help readers.
Superstars’ Weight Loss SecretsReturn to Index
Walking
Your Way to Vitality
Dr. Yun
Kim & Dr. Jacques
MoraMarco
Skyhorse
Publishing
978-1-5107-8471-0
Kindle:
$16.99/Print: $18.00
www.skyhorsepublishing.com
Walking Your Way to Vitality: Integrating Walking, Breathwork, and Mindfulness Into Your Daily Exercise surveys how walking more mindfully can enhance an exercise routine. It takes the idea of walking for exercise a step further by employing the authors’ decades of experience in East Asian medicine and healthcare, outlining six unique walking styles rooted in qi, prana, tai chi, chi gong, and yoga.
This approach elevates the walking effort in different ways that promotes these styles of walking as options for those who would increase the health benefits of simply taking a walk.
More than just a how-to collection of walking strategies, this book incorporates the basic premises and philosophy of each tradition into breathing and movement exercises. One example lies in the survey of quigong movements:
The qigong movements are made with a minimum of effort. No matter how difficult the position is, it is done efficiently and smoothly. This requires you to become conscious of how much effort is required, and then to do just that amount and no more or less.
Differences between vitality walking and traditional walking, methods of individual walks and combinations of these traditions, and complimenting walks with dietary adjustments completes the exercise tips, which will appeal to an unusually wide range of readers, from seniors whose movement abilities are limited to those younger who want to blend different traditions and approaches into their daily walks.
Librarians will find this wide-ranging discussion offers many practical starting points for exercise even for those who barely walk at all, making Walking Your Way to Vitality not just an integrative experience, but a highly accessible gathering of routines that encourage readers to expand their concept of walking for exercise.
Walking Your Way to VitalityReturn to Index
Mortimer's
Magical Goo
Megan K
Palmer
WinnBrook
Press
978-1-967983-12-4
$20.99
HB, $12.99
PB, $2.99 eBook
Website:
https://www.megankpalmer.com/books
Ordering:
https://a.co/d/02k2VqRY
Mortimer's Magical Goo contains appealing illustrations by Nabila Amanda that compliment the story of a boy who refuses to clean his room – until he discovers a magical goo that will clean it for him.
The magical wishing goo seems to be everything he’s needed – until Mortimer discovers that his invention comes with a hefty price tag. It relies on a special ingredient that is hard to find, and so Mortimer determines to apply it wisely. But as he uses his magical goo, he discovers that each wish includes unforeseen consequence.
Read-aloud adults can use this book to explore Mortimer’s dreams and how the reality of their incarnation often negates another benefit of the dilemma which Mortimer hadn’t realized until he eliminated his problem.
Mortimer’s worries about making an effort, being perfect, and preserving the delightful things in life translate to a fun tale that holds many thought-provoking moments of realization about the underlying possibilities of adversity and the detriments of leading a life without challenge.
Librarians that choose Mortimer's Magical Goo for their picture book collections will find it delightfully revealing, thought-provoking, and colorful – perfect for individual recommendation, adults reading to kids, or group enjoyment.
Mortimer's Magical GooReturn to Index
Poppy’s
Egyptian Adventure
E.J.
Stelter
DartFrog
Books
978-1-965253-59-5
$24.99
Hardcover/$17.99 Paperback/$4.99
eBook
www.DartFrogBooks.com
Poppy's Egyptian Adventure: Cruising up the Nile is a picture book addition to the story of two adventuring pups, this one following the duo on a cruise in Egypt.
Noah Warnes provides warm, fun illustration for this adventure, which opens with dog brother Oiseau collecting his adventurous big sister Poppy’s postcards from her travels.
As Poppy guides her younger sibling through the travel experience, young picture book readers will relish not only the dogs, but their supportive relationship and interactions as they discover new things together.
Read-aloud adults will also appreciate the opportunity to review sibling bonds with children over a story which pairs a lively rhyming series of observations with colorful cultural insights:
Leaving the airport, they heard beautiful music from the minarets play,
while men knelt on their carpets and began to pray.
The sun was shining brightly on the busy city street,
and the Great Pyramids stood tall in the famous Egyptian heat.
Elementary-level libraries and adults seeking adventures for the very young will relish the excitement and underlying lessons about exploration, sibling support, and discovery which make Poppy's Egyptian Adventure: Cruising up the Nile a colorful standout.
Poppy’s Egyptian AdventureReturn to Index
Rolo and
the Legend of Jack Bones
Hans Ness
Zira
Press
979-8-9880371-8-7
$11.99
paperback, $6.99 ebook,
audiobook price varies
Website: https://zirapress.com/book_rjb.php
Rolo and the Legend of Jack Bones is the third story in the elementary- to middle-grade romp through adventure and humor, blending genetically enhanced dogs, cats, and us “hoomans” in a rollicking escapade replete with close encounters of the pirate kind.
Rolo faces Jack Bones and his hound crew, who steal the pirate ship on exhibit in a museum. The hooman finds himself trapped at sea with thieves who have no experience with hoomans, in a world no longer ruled by hoomans.
As he learns more about how the Felion Empire banished these hounds and how the war between cats and dogs has simmered ever since, Rolo finds himself in the unusual position of possibly settling matters once and for all.
Readers will relish the fantasy and encounters that inject many characters and surprises into Rolo and the Legend of Jack Bones, which excels in high-octane action and many satisfying twists of plot.
Once again, Sofia Komarenko’s exceptionally colorful portraits of dogs, cats, and hoomans enhance the story with visual attraction that will keep kids engaged and immersed, with Hans Ness at the helm with such characters as Jojo, Master Boopnose, Cap’n McGnaw, and pirate ships with names such as Pug’s Revenge.
Replete with humor throughout, Rolo and the Legend of Jack Bones will introduce many a young person to a special brand of fun and laughter as the characters strive to right wrongs and help this strange, adversarial world come together.
Ness is particularly adept at injecting thought-provoking insights about friendship and the kinds of connections that can change the world, using dialogue to cement intention and psyche in an inviting, thought-provoking way:
“I just feel so … useless.”
“Oh,” said Rolo again. “I know what that’s like.”
“Why? You trying to fix the world too?”
He chuckled. “No, it’s nothing compared to you.”
“Tell me.”
“Really? I’m just having a hard time in school. I didn’t grow up here on Earth, so I’m really far behind. All the other kids think I’m weird and stupid.”
Jojo’s face scrunched. “Stupid? I don’t know what other hoomans are like, but you’re just as smart as a dog.”
Rolo chuckled nervously. “Which do you mean, a pet doggie or a houndrel?”
Rolo’s origins as an outsider serve him well in this latest adventure as he learns what it means to be hooman, animal, or something greater.
Librarians who have seen prior enthusiasm for the Rolo adventures, or who look for standalone stories for young readers packed with colorful high-seas adventures, will find Rolo and the Legend of Jack Bones just the ticket for an attention-grabbing leisure read packed with action and insight.
Rolo and the Legend of Jack BonesReturn to Index