Armed and Dangerous

Abigail Roux
Dreamspinner Press
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

Left alone in Baltimore after his unpredictable lover bails, Special Agent Zane Garrett takes his frustration out on everything in his path until he is ordered to Chicago to back up an undercover operative. When he gets there, though, he finds himself face to face with his wayward partner, Special Agent Ty Grady. They have to deal with the uncertainty lingering between them while they work to retrieve their intended mark, a retired hit man and CIA wet-works operative named Julian Cross.

Ty, once a marine and now an FBI hotshot, has a penchant for being unpredictable, a trait Zane can vouch for. Zane is a man who once lived for his job but has come to realize his heartbreaking past doesn’t have to overshadow his future. They're partners, friends, lovers, and the go-to team for unusual cases. With Cross and his innocuous boyfriend, Cameron Jacobs, in tow, Ty and Zane must navigate the obstacles of a cross-country trek, including TSA pat-downs, blizzards, their uncooperative prisoners, CIA kill teams, a desperate lack of sleep or caffeine, and each other. Ty and Zane are determined to get Julian Cross to DC in one piece, but it’s starting to look like it might be the last thing they do.

My Review

I think I’m done with Ty and Zane.

In this fifth book of the Cut & Run series, it seems that one half of the author duo is now going it alone. And the other half has absconded with the Ty and Zane I loved in the earlier books.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m happy that Ty and Zane are now at the stage of their relationship where they have found a happy equilibrium. The problem is, their behavior is so out of character, especially after Ty’s sudden departure in the last book. Forgiveness happened a little too quickly for my liking, and the excessive declarations of love, the “oh, baby’s” and humming by most of the male characters made me want to stick a fork in my eye.

Number of hums
Ty Grady – 10
Zane Garrett – 6
Julian Cross – 5
Cameron Jacobs – 2
Nick O’Flaherty – 1
Richard Burns – 1

These guys are supposed to be badass. Instead, they are sitting around talking about feelings! I miss the verbal sparring and the snarky humor of the earlier books. The action scenes, though, are as ridiculous and unrealistic as always. While I was able to overlook that before, I am unable to do so now.

“Julian struck out at him so quickly it was easy to think it was imagined. He grabbed the gun and pulled the slide, his free hand moving in a flash, and the gun fell apart in Leatherface’s hand. Julian swung at him with the slide, hitting him in the temple and dropping him in a heap.”

This scene confuses me. No matter how scrappy Julian may be, I seriously doubt he would be able to disarm a rogue CIA agent, strip the slide off his pistol and knock him unconscious. If Julian grabbed the gun to pull the slide, wouldn’t the gun be in Julian’s hand? And while many guns may be designed to be quick and easy to disassemble, they don’t just “fall apart” in someone’s hand.

Unlike earlier books where the focus was on the main couple, we are introduced to two new characters, Julian Cross (the only witness to a contract killing) who Ty and Zane must bring to DC in one piece, and his milquetoast boyfriend, Cameron Jacobs.

The lengthy road trip undertaken by these four guys while Julian and Cameron were often restrained was excruciatingly slow. I quickly tired of their banter. I skimmed through the sex scenes, which were drawn out and repetitive. Julian’s cats, Smith and Wesson, were a nice touch. I hope Ty and Zane get permanent custody.

Since I have the next book on my Kindle, I’ll probably read it. But I don’t have high expectations.

Before the Darkness

Leslie Lee Sanders
Self-Published
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

After an asteroid strikes Earth, a series of violent earthquakes destroy secluded Phoenix and leave survivor Elliot struggling to stay focused in the bleak aftermath. And then he meets fellow survivor Adam. Together, the two search for reliable shelter and other survivors while distant murky clouds fast approach. Their hunt for shelter leads them down an alternate path when they find spray painted symbols directing them to a mysterious place: Refuge Inc.

As ominous clouds slowly shut off all light to their devastated world, they are forced to come to terms with their pasts and their growing attraction for each other.

Neither thought their pasts and personal crises would affect their ability to endure the horrors they're forced to live through. Neither thought they would be drawn so close to one another in the aftermath of an unimaginable catastrophe. By working together, can they continue to survive? Or will the mystery of Refuge Inc. cause diverse expectations and lead them to decisions that further threaten their lives?

My Review

I love post-apocalyptic stories and was thrilled to get the opportunity to read this short novel about two survivors drawn together after their city and everything they knew and loved was destroyed by several massive earthquakes resulting from an asteroid that struck somewhere near the west coast.

Elliot had been walking for many hours. Exhausted, hungry and thirsty, he had no idea where he was or if anyone else survived. He eventually meets Adam, and both men are ecstatic that they are not alone. They talk a lot – mostly about the things they need to do to stay safe, about their lives before the asteroid struck, and about how scared they are. Oh, and they find time to have sex too.

I like my end of world stories fraught with danger and desperation. A little crime and violence and real struggles for survival wouldn’t hurt either. The main problem with this story is I never felt the characters were in any real danger despite the fact that the world they knew no longer exists. There was a developing romance, coming out issues, guilt, clinginess, whining and insecurity. The two main characters exhausted me at times and I often wished they would just shut up and get back to their business of surviving.

Two things kept me reading – the search for Refuge, Inc. and the injured dog, Titan. Just when the story started to get interesting and the search was over, it ended. I’m curious about how the men’s lives will change and am planning to dive into the next book.

May We Shed These Human Bodies

Amber Sparks
Curbside Splendor Publishing, Inc.
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

May We Shed These Human Bodies peers through vast spaces and skies with the world's most powerful telescope to find humanity: wild and bright and hard as diamonds. A whole sideshow's worth of heartbreaking oddballs and freaks.

Amber Sparks is a Washington DC based author whose work has been widely published. She's one of today's freshest literary fiction voices, drawing on fables and mythologies as inspiration for her fiction that explores the human yearning for understanding and uniquely captures her generation's struggle with today's hyper-techno-crazed world. This is her debut story collection.

My Review

This strange, experimental, imaginative collection is full of brilliant ideas and explores serious issues, but I felt many of the stories were a little too clever, wispy and insubstantial as air. I like the combination of magic realism, fantasy and horror and the variety of stories. There was enough weirdness and bizarre situations to capture my interest, and my enjoyment of stories by Aimee Bender and Kelly Link drew me to this collection. Unfortunately, the character development was lacking and I felt no connection to anyone. I’m sad these stories are already starting to slip away.

Murder, Romance, and Two Shootings

Todd Allen Smith
NineStar Press
2 out of 5 stars
Reviewed by Nancy

Summary

The scent of his own blood shakes away the disbelief of the gunman entering the city council room. Todd remembers that smell and can’t deny that he is once more the target of a gunman’s bullet.

Healing from his physical wounds is the easy part, grounded in gratitude for his very survival. Rebuilding his life will be the hard part. But he is reminded he is luckier than others whenever he thinks of his friend Rick who was murdered.

After the first time he was shot, Todd had to learn to walk again, but now he faces the bigger challenge of learning how to love.

My Review

I expected a dark, edgy thriller with a smattering of romance. What I got was something entirely different.

Author Todd Smith had the misfortune of being shot not once, but twice. The first time was during a robbery attempt after moving to a new city. The second occurred on his job reporting on the Kirkwood City Council meeting after he returned to his home state of Missouri. An enraged citizen, complaining of how the city was screwing him over and hurting his business, was responsible for multiple fatalities, include that of the mayor. Todd was lucky to escape with his life, though he suffered a serious gunshot wound to the hand.

This is not a thriller, or romance, or crime novel. It is a fictional account based on the true story of Todd Smith’s life. While names, characters, places and businesses may have been the products of the author’s imagination, it was clear that Todd Smith, the main character, was the author. While the reader learns of the grim circumstances surrounding Todd’s two shootings and the brutal murder of a close friend, we get to watch him grow as a character and get a glimpse of his friendships, his co-workers, his family and his relationships.

The story was fraught with minor errors that I hope were caught in the final version, shallow characterization, and stilted dialogue. I knew that Todd felt pain when he was shot. I knew he grieved over his friend Rick’s brutal slaying. And I knew that he was in love with David. I just couldn’t feel any of it.

Blatant authorial intrusion early in the narrative was disconcerting and confusing. Was I reading a memoir or a novel? The journalistic reportage and dual presence of author and character kept me distant from people, places, and events. I wanted Todd the character and not Todd the author.

Perhaps this would have worked better as a memoir. Though the story was compelling and held my interest throughout, the style left me cold.

Bound for Trouble

EM Lynley
Dreamspinner Press
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

Daniel "Deke" Kane is a broken man, facing the end of his career in the FBI. He's on desk duty after a botched drug raid left the suspects and two children dead. He's got one chance to prove himself, or the only thing he'll be investigating is the Help Wanted ads.

Ryan Griffiths has been on the run for ten years. Forced onto the streets when his father kicked him out, Ryan earns his living in other men's beds. Finding his john dead in a hotel room drives him under the radar until a favorite client gives him a chance at a safe, clean life. But Ryan's relatively stable new world shatters when Deke Kane catches up with him.

When Deke's tasked to take down a drug dealer with terrorist ties and a taste for the dark side of BDSM, his only chance to get close is the suspect's interest in Ryan, and he convinces Ryan to become a confidential informant. In return, Deke offers Ryan immunity from his past. As Ryan falls under the drug lord's domination, Deke finds himself falling for Ryan.

Now Deke has to choose between Ryan's safety and his own future.

My Review

FBI agent Deke Kane was nearly up for a promotion, but screwed up disastrously during a drug raid, causing the deaths of two children. Now he’s desk bound, once again having to prove his worth to his bitchy and flirtatious supervisor, Serah, and to himself.

He gets a second chance on a high-profile case involving Maksim Petrov, a Russian arms dealer with terrorist ties. Though the higher-ups are hoping Deke makes another mistake so they can justify firing him, Serah micromanages every aspect of his investigation in order to keep her record clean.

Deke knows that Petrov frequents the Club Kiwi, a male strip club. His best option is to send in a confidential informant, Ryan Griffiths, a former stripper now gainfully employed in retail and trying to forget his old life.

The attraction between Deke and Ryan is instant, but Ryan is distrustful of the FBI. He also wants justice for his friend’s killer. While Ryan works undercover at a BDSM club as a server and paid submissive, and Deke joins the club to conduct his investigation, their chemistry sizzles.

This is not a simple cop/rent-boy love story. Deke is focused on the investigation while exploring his kinks and watching Ryan fall under Petrov’s spell. As Deke’s feelings for Ryan grow, he becomes more and more concerned about the role Ryan is playing, his desire for pain, and the dangers they face.

Since Ryan and Deke have not spent a lot of time really getting to know each other, it was hard for me to believe their love was real. The investigation details were riveting, but the plot was over-the-top and not very believable. There is a smidgen of graphic violence and lots of kinky sex.

As much as I enjoy hot sex scenes, I need to be emotionally invested in the characters. I wasn’t.

Stung

K.A. Merikan
Acerbi & Villani Ltd.
2 out of 5 stars
Reviewed by Nancy

Summary

October 1907, Honeyhill

Twenty years into the zombie Plague

Victor is a man of delicate sensibilities, not fit to do backbreaking labour on a farm ran by the mob. Upon arrival in Honeyhill, he decides he needs an anchor, an alliance with one of the guards, if he wants to survive. That anchor comes in the form of Crunch, a hunky ex-sailor with a pair of tight leather trousers and a ruggedly handsome face.

But from day one, Victor knows he won’t last long with the hard physical work assigned to him and the torment he suffers at the hands of a sadistic guard. He needs to run, and his new alliance might prove to be a burden instead of solace.

If Crunch wants Honeyhill liberated, he needs to focus on his job, not on protecting Victor, one of many new arrivals on the farm. Distraction is the last thing he needs after months of undercover work. But it’s hard not to get seduced by Victor’s big brown eyes and fingertips that don’t know work. Hundreds of people depend on Crunch keeping his identity a secret, revealing it could be fatal for both him and Victor, and a failure of his mission.

Thankfully, Victor would never be dumb enough to try and escape through a forest that’s swarming with zombies. Would he?

My Review

So much promise, so disappointing.

London in the early 20th century, zombies, a prisoner/guard romance, a labor camp ruled by a powerful family, and sweet, sweet honey. What’s not to love?

The story starts out with Victor, a young singer, and other prisoners being transported by cattle car to the Dal family’s work camp, known as Honeyhill, where they will serve their sentences. Since Victor is blindfolded and hands bound behind his back, he has no idea where he is going.

“Suddenly, the struggle to raise above the others was gone as the wagon filled with cool air and the crowd moved, carrying Victor with it. He frantically clutched at the fabric of someone’s skirt, but the stream of people came to an abrupt stop with a loud bang that made Victor’s ears ring. The air filled with a new smell, smoky, a bit like fireworks.”

Besides the wrong word usage here, how in the world did Victor manage to clutch at someone’s skirt while his hands were tied behind his back?

Sadly, there were many instances of odd word choices and awkward sentences which distracted me from the story.

Right off the bat, Victor is a very unlikable character. Before he’s even out of his bonds, he’s already making eyes at an attractive guard named Crunch. He’s desperate, lonely and hungry and wants to ally himself with someone who has influence and control over others. Unfortunately, he has not given any thought whatsoever to his dire circumstances, which suddenly don’t seem so dire now that he’s found a love interest. Maybe it’s just me, but when I’m reading a prison story, I’d like for the incarcerated character to suffer a little and endure some hardship. Instead, Victor comes off as needy, manipulative, and immature.

Crunch was a far more interesting character. Unlike the other prison guards, he has an agenda of his own. While working to bring his own plans to fruition, he is also very protective of Victor and is charming when showing a bit of vulnerability and insecurity. Crunch feels lucky to have Victor, as Victor would likely not be interested in a man like him in the real world.

The best moments in the story for me were the creepy, tense scenes involving the evil guard, Sharp, the zombies, and the bees.

Considering that the story took place in 1907, there was little here that made the setting, clothing, mannerisms and dialogue feel authentic. Perhaps, with more world building, this could have been effective as a steampunk novel or alternate history. As it is, the background is flat and the romance unconvincing. I am happy that the authors ended the story realistically, without a schmoopy epilogue.

A Little Light On The Funny

Seriously... I'm Kidding by Ellen DeGeneres
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

5 GLORIOUS STARS!!! is what I wanted to give Seriously...I'm Kidding when I first picked it up. The peace and kindness message is great, but this lacks the funny far too much for an autobio from a comedian.

I love Ellen DeGeneres. Wait, let me back up. I love the idea of Ellen DeGeneres. I really like her show. Her stand-up...meh. Unfortunately, this book is more like her stand-up. This very quick read (actually, I listened to her read it and it was only 3 cds) is filled with her silly titter-inducing jokesque things. It's also filled with fluff. There are whole chapters of filler. There are sections of her making nonsensical noises, her eating, and her saying nothing. Literally intentional silence. As if that wasn't bad enough, there's a whole bit about dreams. I would've preferred more silence.

I'd say about halfway through I thought Seriously...I'm Kidding deserved about 3 stars, but the latter half took a complete nose-dive. Very boring, tedious even.

That's sad. I had high hopes. I guess I'll go back to checking out Youtube clips of her show. Those crack me up.

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Truth in the Dark

Amy Lane
Dreamspinner Press
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

"I am not beautiful..."

Knife's entire existence has been as twisted as his flesh and his face. The only thing beautiful in his life is his sister. When Gwennie is obliged to turn a suitor down because she fears to leave her brother to the brutality of their village, Knife is desperate for anything to ensure her happiness.

Her suitor's cousin offers him a way out, but it won't be easy. Aerie-Smith has been cursed to walk upright in the form of a beast, and his beloved village suffers from the same spell. Aerie-Smith offers Gwen a trousseau and some hope, if only Knife will keep him company on his island for the span of a year and perform one "regrettable task" at year's end.

Knife is unprepared for the form the island's curse takes on his own misshapen body. In one moment of magic, he is given the body of his dreams—and he discovers that where flesh meets spirit and appearance meet reality, sometimes the only place to find truth is in the darkness of a lover's arms.

My Review

“If anyone had learned that love was all the beauty the world needed, it was my lion-hearted beloved and his imperfect lover.”

I usually like Amy Lane’s blend of sweetness and angst and was keen to read a re-worked version of Beauty and the Beast, but this story just didn’t work for me on so many levels.

- The pace was excruciatingly slow, so slow that I feared not finishing it up in time to complete my reading challenge this month. Many times I was tempted to skim or abandon it. I was glad I held out, though, for the ending was realistic and satisfying.

- Naef’s physical and emotional pain was exquisitely rendered. I hated being in his head, however. His bitterness, self-loathing, swearing, and constant correction of his name (“my name is Knife”) became annoying.

- The relationship between Naef and Aerie-Smith happened way too fast and lacked spark. Their sex was frequent, but unerotic. Maybe it’s just the thought of doing it with a lion, even if he stands on two legs and wears a high-quality waistcoat, that was a complete turnoff for me.

- While I felt Naef’s character grew significantly, I wanted to feel that growth in his and Aerie-Smith’s relationship as well. As a couple, they left me feeling unconvinced.

- Aerie-Smith was a rather flat character who was too perfect.

- I really enjoyed Naef’s passion for carving and how he used it to express himself.

- Kudos for including interesting and likable female characters.

I wanted to like this story a lot more. There were some powerful turns of phrase, and sentences that had me scratching my head.

Sadly, it failed to move me.

Aki's Love Song

Sedonia Guillone
Ai Press
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

Since high school, Tamotsu has watched his best friend Aki grow from a rebellious but musically talented teenager to one of the most popular music artists in Japan. Though he’s been secretly in love with Aki for years, enduring the endless string of admirers Aki takes for lovers, Tamotsu suffers silently because he knows deep down that he is really the one person in the world Aki turns to for true friendship and solace.

But when Aki unveils an unknown and haunting love song he’s composed in secret during a concert, Tamotsu fears that Aki has finally found someone he can have a lasting relationship with. Only such a deep, abiding passion could inspire a song that beautiful.

Is Aki really saying good bye to him in the only way he can, through his music? Or is Aki telling Tamotsu something else?

My Review

"His breath shortened as Aki began to sing, a slow, heart-rending ballad about unrequited love and the tremors of his heart in the presence of the one who was completely unaware.”

In many ways this was similar to Soy Sauce Face. Two Japanese men deeply in love for years and unable to express their feelings toward each other, one physically slight while the other is hardened from manual labor, and one very loyal and protective while the other flits from one loveless relationship to another.

While reading about Jun and Tomo’s relationship made me feel like I was cocooned in a warm blanket, Aki and Tamotsu felt a little distant, making it difficult for me to connect with them. I suspect much of that had to do with the third-person narration, which felt like all telling and not much showing.

By the end of this competently written short story, I was unable to summon a single emotion.

The Immigration Solution: A Better Plan Than Today's

Heather Mac Donald et al.
Ivan R. Dee Publisher
2 out of 5 stars
Reviewed by Nancy

Summary

Undoubtedly the United States needs a liberal and welcoming immigration policy, geared to the needs and interests of the nation. In this urgent new book, three astute observers argue that we have lost control of our southern border, so that the vast majority of our immigrants are now illegal Mexicans. Poor, uneducated, and unskilled, these newcomers add much less to the national wealth than they cost the taxpayers for their health care, the education of their children, and (too often) their incarceration. The Immigration Solution proposes a policy that admits skilled and educated people on the basis of what they can do for the country, not what the country can do for them.

My Review

“A nation that cannot control its borders is not a nation.”
― Ronald Reagan


This collection of essays by Heather Mac Donald, Victor Davis Hanson, and Steven Malanga explores the economic and social consequences of illegal immigration and proposes sensible solutions for controlling and securing our borders.

While these essays were very readable and thought-provoking, I couldn’t help but notice what was missing. When I’m reading books like this, I like to know what works the authors have cited so I can do my own fact checking. Some of those works were mentioned throughout the text, but it would be so much easier for this information to be presented in one place.

On the plus side, this is a short book that covers a wide variety of issues in just enough detail to make this reader want to explore further.

I am liberal on a lot of issues, but my views on immigration tend to lean towards the right. I advocate the world’s nations have a right to maintain sovereignty and a strong cultural identity. I dislike the idea of open borders, so many of the ideas presented by the authors make sense to me. I also dislike the idea of building walls and increasing military presence at borders, because these solutions can be prohibitively expensive and I question their effectiveness in stemming the flow of humanity.

As an American of Puerto Rican descent, I took offense to Heather Mac Donald’s essay on Hispanic family values. While some of the facts presented may have been accurate, her use of anecdotal evidence and hostile tone left a bad taste in my mouth.

For instance:

“The fathers of these illegitimate children are often problematic in even more troubling ways. Social workers report that the impregnators of young Hispanic women are with some regularity their uncles, not necessarily seen as a bad thing by the mother’s family. Alternatively, the father may be the boyfriend of the girl’s mother, who then continues to stay with the grandmother. Older men seek out young girls in the belief that a virgin cannot get pregnant during her first intercourse, and to avoid sexually transmitted diseases.”

I know there are problems and challenges faced by Hispanic communities. I believe many of them can be addressed by learning the language of the host nation and assimilating into its culture. We are not doing immigrants a favor by offering bilingual education. It obviously hasn’t solved the high Hispanic dropout rate.

In her essay, “Mexico’s Undiplomatic Diplomats”, Mac Donald explores how Mexico provokes illegal immigration by its own corruption and interference in US internal affairs, especially pertaining to immigrants. (Why does the US need 47 Mexican consulates?) It can be read here.

The final essay by Steven Malanga offers a common-sense approach to immigration that serves US national interests.

- Preferences given to immigrants based on work skills and education. Countries such as Australia, Ireland and Canada have different methods of handling this. Stop admitting unskilled workers who provide little benefit for the economy.
- Restrict social welfare programs that attract immigration from poor countries and eliminate government benefits to those in the US illegally.
- Ensure businesses verify workers’ legal status before employing them.
- Fully enforce immigration laws that are already in the book.
- Increase efforts to secure borders.

If you stop feeding them, they will go away.



It is important to know who lives within our borders. Our national security depends on it.

Survivor

J.F. Gonzalez
Dorchester Publishing
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

It was supposed to have been a romantic weekend getaway. Lisa was looking forward to spending time alone with her husband, and telling him that they were going to have a baby.

Instead, it became a nightmare when her husband was arrested and Lisa was kidnapped. But the kidnappers aren't asking for ransom. They want Lisa herself. They're going to make her a star . . . in a snuff film.

My Review

Survivor is sick, twisted, and very, very disturbing. I briefly considered abandoning it in frustration after Lisa did what she had to do to get out of her situation. Then I realized I had to finish to see if Tim, Animal and the other depraved monsters got their due. I'm relieved it is finally done and the book safely out of my house.

I honestly don't know what possessed me to buy this. I like well written horror stories and don't mind some violence and gore, but Survivor wasn't particularly well written and the excessive violence and brutality made me feel dirty for reading it.

Two stars because I got sucked in and managed to finish it.

I Was Told There'd Be Laughs

I Was Told There'd Be Cake by Sloane Crosley
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This won awards, was a best seller and was heralded by critics? I feel like the publishing world needed a darling in 2008 in the humorist category and chose Crosley for lack of a better.

Occasionally humorous, sure, but I couldn't get past the notion that this was the humor of the spoiled, the unchallenging laughs of white privilege, the shrug-it-off-and-smile of upper-middle-class woes, such as forgetting your keys, leaving your wallet behind, spending hundreds on a locksmith after locking yourself out of your Manhattan apartment, enduring an annoyed boss because you're a kid just out of an expensive college who has no real marketable skills, getting lice at summer camp...at summer camp...jaysus, even the book's title has a "let them eat cake" sense of careless entitlement.

Credit where credit's due, Sloane Crosley is a decent writer and a decent humorist. She can turn a good phrase now and then, enough to garner spot laughs through out.

The problem is a lack of material worth writing about. Come on, a whole chapter on the computer game The Oregon Trail? Admittedly, I've written about the game in a book of mine, for about a paragraph, not a whole fucking chapter! This book feels like the author is just too young, lacks any meaningful life experiences worth writing about, and is stretching the hell out of what little has happened to her.

Case Closed. No More Parker Pyne For Me, Thanks!

Parker Pyne Investigates by Agatha Christie
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Fantasy Island for the mystery set!

This isn't Agatha Christie's typical who-dunnit mystery. Half the people that come to "investigator" Parker Pyne for help are just bored. Makes sense since that's who he advertises for, those who are unhappy and don't know what to do about it. So, his clients are often people with money who want someone else to make life interesting again for them...

That is difficult for me to swallow. I come from a background where money had to be hard-earned, penny by penny. As I've aged I've also learned the value of time. I tend to loath people who say, "I'm bored" and I feel "killing time" deserves capital punishment. It is murder after all. So, I found the very premise of Parker Pyne Investigates repugnant.

Much of this book is wish fulfillment. A client meets with Pyne, unburdens his woes, and then Pyne sets up an improbably scenario in order to spice up that person's life. In these short stories, Pyne sets up thrilling adventures and minor mysteries to put a little pep in his client's lives. More than once the issue is little more than a husband or wife who's bored with the other. So Pyne creates jealousy and soon they both realize how foolish they've been, how much they still love one another, and they live happily ever after. I honestly could've slept my way through this book.

There are a few actual crimes solved herein and occasionally Pyne flashes Sherlockian genius. Pyne is no Poirot, other than his girth, but occasionally Christie can't help but mix in some of that crafty Belgium's cleverness. However, there's not enough character in this character. Again, his girth aside, Pyne is flat. The most interesting things about him are his intuition into human nature and his unintentionally absurd notion that lying to your significant other is the key to a solid relationship. Yes, I understand "white lies" are what is meant or at least what it could be explained away as, but it honestly sounded like ridiculous, archaic advice column mumbo jumbo. Hell, this whole book is mumbo jumbo!!!



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The Last Men on Earth

Mark Allan Gunnells
Red Door Productions
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

The world as we know it has ended in plague. Only two men seem to have survived, traveling alone, forging a bond that one considers love and the other considers convenience. Until another survivor, a young woman, is added to the mix. How far will one man go for love...?

My Review

I like how Mark Allan Gunnells manages to create characters with substance in such a short format, injecting horrifying little twists and keeping the reader on edge. For that reason, I always look forward to reading his stories.

This one, however, was way too short for me to develop any feelings about the characters. The twist wasn’t especially surprising either.

After I reached the conclusion, my feelings ended up being similar to the story’s narrator.

“I felt nothing. Not guilt, not horror at my actions, but no particular pleasure either.”

I LOVE Star Wars, But This?...Not So Much

Outcast by Aaron Allston
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Is this lazy writing or a rushed production? Maybe it's both.

Aaron Allston's Outcast, in which the Jedi order is being subverted, kicks off the nine-novel "Fate of the Jedi" series for the Star Wars franchise. Allston would write three of the novels, while two other writers worked on the other six, and all this was done within three years.

That's a lot of writing in a short period. It would seem like they just wanted to pump this stuff out. I mean, nine books in three years is a lot. On the other hand, it's only one book per year for each writer. That should be doable without rushing things. Quality should be maintained.

However, some poor writing got published here. Too many smiles and glares are "offered" and "given". I lost count of the number of times an expressed emotion was given to someone else. After a while I stopped giving fucks.

Maybe Allston is a shitty writer. Or maybe he could've or would've done better given time. Outcast reads like an early draft in which place-holder text is left on the page in order to expedite the writing process. A writer at leisure would go back and revise, remove redundancies, vary the language, make sure the damn words have the correct meaning for what is being said, etc.

I don't care about the vast expo dumps or the tropes trooping about. This is a sci-fi soap opera. I get that. I'm just looking at this from a reader's perspective. The ability to run your eyes over the page without tripping up on some non-sensical sentiment or having the 4th wall busted down because a repetitious phrase is hitting your eyes with the consistency and irritation of a Chinese water torture device.

That truly is unfortunate, because if you're a Star Wars fan, young or old, there's good to be found within these pages. The action scenes (occasionally gratuitous now and then, but not a big quibble) are handled well. Plus, our old friends Luke, Leia, Han, C3P0 and R2D2 are all here. Joining them are a platoon of sons and daughters, nieces and nephews, and grandkids. The warm-fuzzy of familiarity brought on by beloved characters goes a long way in fostering forgiveness for a book's other faults.

Tongue

Kyung-Ran Jo
Bloomsbury USA
Reviewed by Nancy
2 out of 5 stars

Summary

Emotionally raw and emphatically sensual, Tongue is the story of the demise of an obsessive romance and a woman's culinary journey toward self-restoration and revenge. When her boyfriend of seven years leaves her for another woman, the celebrated young chef Jung Ji-won shuts down the cooking school she ran from their home and sinks into deep depression, losing her will to cook, her desire to eat, and even her ability to taste. Returning to the kitchen of the Italian restaurant where her career first began, she slowly rebuilds her life, rediscovering her appreciation of food, both as nourishment and as sensual pleasure. She also starts to devise a plan for a final, vengeful act of culinary seduction.

Tongue is a voluptuous, intimate story of a gourmet relying on her food-centric worldview to emerge from heartbreak; a mesmerizing, delicately plotted novel at once shocking and profoundly familiar.

My Review

I really wanted to love this story. It’s a relatively short book at only 212 pages, but it wasn’t one of those books I could easily read in one or two sittings. There just wasn’t enough there to really draw me in and engage my emotions. A well-known young chef mourns the loss of her 7-year relationship. She loses her desire to cook, to eat, and even her sense of taste. Gradually, she starts to put her life back together and returns to the Italian restaurant where she started her career. This is more difficult than it sounds, as she is still obsessed with her ex-boyfriend and is unable to completely let him go.

It's well-written, but the passion and intensity was missing for me. I expect a book that explores the life of a woman grieving a failed relationship and where food is such a significant part of the story to overwhelm my emotions and senses. The main and secondary characters are very distant. The food is well described, but I couldn't taste or smell it. The boyfriend is hardly described at all. What little I knew of him, I didn’t like and couldn’t understand why the chef was so obsessed with him. Even the conclusion failed to disturb or elicit much emotion.

Still, it's rather unusual and I'm not sorry I read it.

A Princess of Mars

A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I'm not saying I didn't like it, but what in the hell was that?!

Okay, I kinda am saying I didn't like it, but I didn't HATE it either.

A Princess of Mars is a forerunner in the sci-fi genre and as many of them suffer from ignorant science, so suffers this one. Modes of transportation are silly, alien races are simplistic at best, etc etc...(I know I'm nitpicking).

On the other hand, one has to be impressed with the guesswork a fictional novelist made regarding living conditions on another planet, considering he was writing at a time prior to space exploration. Hell, this was written a mere nine years after the first flight by man.

The real reason this didn't resonate with me had to do with the story's hero, John Carter. He's just too good at everything to be interesting. "Oh yeah, he can do that, too? Ho-hum..." I found myself saying at about the mid-way point...a point at which I was still trying to suss out how he'd actually arrived on Mars.

The writing also suffers from stiff formality. The rigidity of the language Burroughs' used lacked elegance and deflated exciting action scenes. However, there was plenty of action and that alone kept me turning pages.

All the same, the errors mounted. Burroughs made the mistake of giving the game away. Use of the diary style of narration is a technique in fiction that should never have happened. If the hero of the story is writing about his adventures ten, twenty, whatever number of years after it all went down, it completely gives away the fact that he lived to tell the tale and thus takes the wind out of tension's sails. Present tense for action, always present tense!

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Mysterious Wish Fulfillment

Parker Pyne Investigates by Agatha Christie
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Fantasy Island for the mystery set!

This isn't Agatha Christie's typical who-dunnit mystery. Half the people that come to "investigator" Parker Pyne for help are just bored. Makes sense since that's who he advertises for, those who are unhappy and don't know what to do about it. So, his clients are often people with money who want someone else to make life interesting again for them...

That is difficult for me to swallow. I come from a background where money had to be hard-earned, penny by penny. As I've aged I've also learned the value of time. I tend to loath people who say, "I'm bored" and I feel "killing time" deserves capital punishment. It is murder after all. So, I found the very premise of Parker Pyne Investigates repugnant.

Much of this book is wish fulfillment. A client meets with Pyne, unburdens his woes, and then Pyne sets up an improbably scenario in order to spice up that person's life. In these short stories, Pyne sets up thrilling adventures and minor mysteries to put a little pep in his client's lives. More than once the issue is little more than a husband or wife who's bored with the other. So Pyne creates jealousy and soon they both realize how foolish they've been, how much they still love one another, and they live happily ever after. I honestly could've slept my way through this book.

There are a few actual crimes solved herein and occasionally Pyne flashes Sherlockian genius. Pyne is no Poirot, other than his girth, but occasionally Christie can't help but mix in some of that crafty Belgium's cleverness. However, there's not enough character in this character. Again, his girth aside, Pyne is flat. The most interesting things about him are his intuition into human nature and his unintentionally absurd notion that lying to your significant other is the key to a solid relationship. Yes, I understand "white lies" are what is meant or at least what it could be explained away as, but it honestly sounded like ridiculous, archaic advice column mumbo jumbo. Hell, this whole book is mumbo jumbo!!!



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A Gaiman Book That Doesn't Feel Very Gaimany

InterWorld by Neil Gaiman
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I didn't know what to expect. Once I knew, I expected more. I got less.

Interworld is the coming-of-age story of a boy finding himself, quite literally. Joey Harker is your typical kid, whose main concern is a certain girl and popularity at school. He comes off fairly average, but the way he's written, you're never sure if he's smart or stupid. Whatever the case, he sure did know a lot of pop culture references through out the ages, regardless of his own age and point of reference, so I would have to guess that he spends all of his time gathering useless knowledge that a kid his age normally wouldn't know. That isn't really touched on in the book.

Everything seems normal, until SUDDENLY occasionally bad writing with adverbs and such force the plot and Joey into a world where science (or pseudo-science) and magic are thrust together, supposedly in many forms, through out a multi-dimensional universe. Countless possibilities exist on an infinite number of planes...yet the survival of everyone and everything falls into the hands of one boy and his misfit band of buddies. Of course it does. What is everyone else doing? Why don't they lend a hand? I mean, there is quite a lot at stake here, their own existence for one. Meh, let's sweep that under the rug. Ain't nobody got time for that!

So, Joey and his pals fight the baddies with special powers and it's all supposed to be very exciting, but it's not. I've read worse, but seldom do I care less and just want to get through with a book.

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Cheerleading By The Cheerless

Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Natalie Goldberg's whiny drone sapped the life out of anything of value she had to say. And what did she have to say? Nothing beyond what other books of this kind say and say with more clarity.

This is just your bog-standard cheerleader-style writing advice, but delivered in a cheerless voice.

GO YOU! YOU CAN DO IT!!!

Yeah, that sort of stuff can be inspiring, but a whole book's worth will take the punch out of any pep talk. Plus, when Goldberg says it, it sounds like, "Go...you. *sigh* You can...do it?"

Clearly it was a mistake to listen to this one on tape. Hey, I had an old car with a cassette deck and 30 minutes to and from work to kill. Roadrage can be quelled with a good audiobook. Unfortunately. Writing Down the Bones made me want to play pinball with my Hyundai, using the other cars on the highway as the bumpers.

Frankly I found a great deal more worth in Stephen King's On Writing and I'm not even a King fan. Writing Down the Bones won't steer you wrong, hell you might even learn a thing or two, but it nearly had me steering for the nearest bridge abutment.





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