Month: September 2012

Review: Ravished Before Sunrise by Lia Davis

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> blog tours> book reviews
Format read: ebook from author
Formats available: ebook
Genre: paranormal romance,
Series: 1Night Stand
Length: 31 pages
Publisher: Decadent Publishing
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, All Romance Ebooks

Born with the unusual ability to see what truly lies in the shadows, Emalee Black is stuck between two worlds, the paranormal and the human. Neither one accepts or understands her and she’s forced to live a quiet, boring life in hiding. When her best friend mentions 1Night Stand dating service, Ema chooses a role-playing adventure straight out of her romantic fantasies. She’s to hunt her very own vampire and have her wicked way him.

Vampire Darian Wyman is surprised when his daughter signs him up for a one-night stand with an exclusive matchmaking agency. At first he’s appalled by the idea, but as he reads the details of the date, he becomes intrigued. For one night he will get away from the life he has long grown tired of to be hunted and captured by a would-be huntress. But he has plans of his own for his little vixen.

However, when Darian discovers the truth about Ema’s inhuman abilities, the date could end before it gets started.

I’ve confessed this before, the 1Night Stand series is kind of a guilty pleasure for me. They’re short, and when they’re done well (and this one is done quite well) they manage to pack a naughty but nice little happily ever after into a tidy package. Whoever came up with this idea was a genius.

Emalee wants to be the hunter, just for one night. She wants to live out the fantasy in her paranormal romances, and hunt a vampire. She thinks it’s going to be make-believe, except that Ema has a secret. She knows there really are vampires. She can sense them. And shifters. And demons. Oh yeah, and her BFF is a witch.

Darian doesn’t want this little one night stand at all. But there is one woman on earth that he can’t say “no” to. His daughter. She bought it for him as a present. He’s been moping around a bit too long since his wife died. When you’re a vampire, a real one, being a widower can last pretty close to forever.

The one night stand is supposed to be just that, one night. But it can be more. Especially when both parties find exactly what they were looking for. Even though neither of them knew they were looking at all.

Escape Rating B+: Just plain fun. Absolutely marvelous decadent and deliciously sexy fun. Darian and Ema find so much more than they are looking for. Ema finds stuff she didn’t even know was available to be found, like the secret to her powers. She doesn’t even know what she is, and Darian opens up an entire universe to her. In return, she brings him back to life. Almost literally, she gives him a second chance at feeling alive. But I liked that it didn’t resolve immediately. The epilogue is 6 months later, so it’s insta-lust and insta-recognition, but not insta-love.

Good story for such a short package. I wish there were more.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Dual Review: Timeless Desire by Gwyn Cready

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | 3 Stars> 4 Stars> book reviews> Dual Review> Originally published at Book Lovers, Inc.> The Latin Lover> The Rocket Lover

Format read: eARC provided by publisher
Release Date: 18 July 2012
Number of pages: 384 pages
Publisher: Astor and Blue
Formats available: ebook, paperback
Purchasing Info: Goodreads, Author’s Website, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Astor and Blue

Blurb:

Two years after losing her husband, overworked librarian Panna Kennedy battles to distract herself from crushing Grief, even as she battles to deal with yet another library budget cut. During a routine search within the library’s lower levels, Panna opens an obscure, pad-locked door and finds herself transported to the magnificent, book-filled quarters of a handsome, eighteenth-century Englishman.

She soon recognizes the man as Colonel John Bridgewater, the historic English war hero whose larger-than-life statue loomed over her desk.However, the life of the dashing Bridgewater is not at all what she imagined. He’s under house arrest for betraying England, and now looks upon her a beautiful and unexpected half-dressed visitor as a possible spy.

Despite bad first impressions (on both sides), Bridgewater nonetheless warms to Panna, and pulls her into his escape while both their hearts pull the other headlong into their soul-stirring secrets.Very quickly Panna is thrown into a whirlwind of high-stakes intrigue that sweeps her from Hadrian’s Wall to a forbidding stone castle in Scotland. And somewhere in the outland, Panna must decide if her loyalties lie with her dead husband, or with the man whose life now depends on her.

Our Thoughts: 

Stella: I am a big fan of Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series and have been on the lookout of similar time travel/historical romances, so when I heard of Timeless Desire I was excited to read it. I think the biggest disservice but also what gets people’s attention is that it is marketed as “an Outlander love story”, and the comparison arises, and unfortunately it’s not in Timeless Desire’s favour.

Marlene: I am also a fan of Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series, so when I saw the subtitle of Timeless Desire, I jumped on it, and for the same reasons you did, Stella. I wondered if it was anything like Gabaldon’s classic. It’s not. The closest one could say is Outlander-lite, in size, scope and depth.

Stella: I agree Marlene. When I saw that Timeless Desire was “an Outlander love story” I was expecting an epic love story just like Claire’s and Jamie’s, but Panna and Jamie’s (yes, the hero is Jamie as well) romance lacked the depth and heart-squeezing intensity Outlander delivered. It was fluff. No problem with that if it is not compared with its namesake predecessor. I found both Panna and Jamie’s character lacking depth and development, they remained sketched, neither really went through any character evolution, and their love was lukewarm. Nice but nothing sizzling or memorable. And speaking of the main characters, Panna is a librarian just like you Marlene, what was your take on her, was she really an authentic one?

Marlene: First, there are two names in romance that probably authors just shouldn’t get near with a barge-pole. Any barge-pole. It’s probably going to take two or three generations before it’s safe to name a romantic hero Roarke, especially if he’s Irish. And never name a Scotsman Jamie, especially not if his wife is a time-traveler. Just don’t go there. Jamie Frasier is going to stand very tall for a very long time.

Stella: Couldn’t agree more. It’s really an author-suicide, or at the least crazy brave…

Marlene: However, Panna sounded and talked like a librarian. I read her inner dialogue about her work, and she sounded like “one of us”. The budget problems and service issues and the balancing act she had to do were very real. And I have library stories to match hers. I’ve even worked in a Carnegie library, and I worked in a town that had an old Carnegie donation story almost as strange as the one she told.

Stella: That part then must have been fun for you 😀 Regarding the plot I found that there was too much happening: the historical plotline combined with their romance and all the secondary characters and their happenings, Jamie’s parentage story, the rebellion, etc. was too much for the 380 pages (no wonder Diana Gabaldon needs 1000 or so for everything she wants to pack in one novel). I found the story fractured as the narrative jumped around, each chapter bringing a change of scenery as we witnessed different characters and their POVs.

Marlene: There was a LOT happening, but I only felt like I was following three characters; Jamie, Panna or Adderly. What was hard to follow was the shift to to the Scots side of the border. That entire storyline wasn’t resolved until the very end.

Stella: Besides Panna, Jamie and Adderly there was Clare and Undine that I can also remember. Would have preferred to stick to just the hero/heroine’s POV. As to the writing, while it flew smoothly, I had a problem with the ton of quotes. Although at first I found it an entertaining quirk, soon I found the many quotes peppered in the story were too much and made me lose interest.

Marlene: Panna’s self-talk did come out as a bunch of quotations, but it didn’t really bother me. There were times when I felt like she was talking to herself as a way of keeping herself sane, or because there wasn’t anyone else who could understand her frame of reference. (Or maybe I talk to myself in my head a lot, too. Mmm, that’s an odd thought. I’ll have to think about that one some more…)

Stella: I didn’t mind her inner monologues or even out loud pep talks, those were just a part of her characterization, what I meant was that her monologues were often full of quotations from poems or famous plays: Pope, Shakespeare, etc. Maybe I noticed that because I tend to note down quotes from books I like and it really popped out to me how many she referenced. And if I already mentioned the quotes I found too much, let me tell you about my other complaints about the plot. I felt that the attempted rape scene felt forced and even improbable, as I wouldn’t imagine guards in a castle attempting to rape the wife of their employer’s grandson.

Marlene: If you mean the scene I’m thinking of, by that time his grandfather was out of power, and the English and Scots didn’t think of each other as the same people. The family ties don’t seem to have been too strong. I think the real problem, as you point out Stella, is that the scene was just plain unnecessary. It doesn’t seem to serve any particular purpose in the story.

Stella: Exactly Marlene. The guards are working for the grandfather, who as their employer gave them an order to bring him his grandson and wife and besides this family tie, there was also the time restraint: the guards only had a couple of minutes to take them upstairs. I just felt that this scene was forced into the story to draw another parallel to the attempted rape scene in Outlander. And I wasn’t too happy with the resolution of most of the plotlines, I especially found the way Jamie’s parentage was neatly tied up way too convenient and rose-y…

Marlene: I had an entirely different issue with this resolution–I’ve read it before. There’s another very long saga of historical fiction about the Scots border country, The Lymond Chronicles, written by Dorothy Dunnett. One of the major plot points concerns the hero’s parentage, and is resolved (after 6 very long books) in extremely similar fashion to Jamie’s. In the Lymond Chronicles, that resolution has a LOT more emotional weight than it did in Timeless Desire, but it takes an enormous amount of reading to get there. But if you love historical fiction, Lymond is definitely worth the investment (sorry, no time-travel). Start with The Game of Kings.

Stella: Thanks Marlene, I’ll take note. There were plenty of similarities/references to the original Outlander by Diana Gabaldon: both heroes are called Jamie, a secondary character is named “Clare” as clear reference to Gabaldon’s heroine who is “Claire”, the forced marriage for political reasons, the attempted rape scene, the strained relationship between Jamie and his family/kinsmen, his forced oath, etc. and though these could have been like a tongue in cheek humour for the Gabaldon fans, I find it rather disappointing that Gwyn Cready didn’t go on a completely untravelled road but instead chose to follow exactly in Outlander’s footsteps. Any others that jumped out at you Marlene? And how did you feel about them?

Marlene: I also saw the similarities to Gabaldon’s Outlander, and whenever they came up, I could generally predict that Cready would take the opposite tack from Gabaldon. There was a sense that she wanted to explore some of “the road not taken”, but not go too far down the path. Undine the witch is good instead of evil like Geillis Duncan. No virgins on the wedding night (hallelujah!). Panna is a widow, and is not leaving a husband behind. Jamie comes forward in time instead of Panna going back. At least Cready did not use the standing stones as her time-travel device (Double hallelujah on this one)

Stella: Hm.. I still found too many similarities to the “original” one.

Verdict:

Stella: I expected an epic love story and instead got fluff. The characters remained flat and two dimensional, and though the story was nice it remained rather lukewarm and forgettable. Timeless Desire though marketed as “an Outlander romance” is a very different kind of story: even though the premise sounds similar, Timeless Desire is a lighter and less layered story. If I hadn’t read Outlander first I might have enjoyed Timeless Desire more, but as it is I found it a light and average romance.

I give Timeless Desire 3 stars.

Marlene: I expected fluff, so I wasn’t surprised when I got it. Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander is 688 pages, and you need the first three books to complete the initial saga, so Outlander plus Dragonfly in Amber plus Voyager equals 2320 pages, I just checked. Timeless Desire is very, very lite, and very, very fluffy. But I found it a lot of fun for what it was.

And as a librarian, I loved the shout out to libraries as places where you really can travel in time and space. Admittedly, you normally do it through the pages of books using your imagination, and not by walking through a door into a rip in time. But what the heck. I adored the concept. I always wanted the TARDIS to stop in my library. Still do.

I got caught up in Panna’s story. I give Timeless Desire 4 stars.

 ps. Marlene has already reviewed Timeless Desire at her blog but we couldn’t resist the idea of having a duelling chat here, so if you’d like to check out more of Marlene’s thoughts click here.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.
 
You have the chance now to enter a giveaway hosted by Gwyn Cready and win a pair of shoes or gift cards!
 
Giveaway is open to US residents only and ends on 14 September 2012.

 ENTER HERE.

Review: All He Ever Needed by Shannon Stacey

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | A Reviews> book reviews
Format read: eARC from NetGalley
Formats available: ebook, Mass Market Paperback
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Series: Kowalski Family #4
Length: 384 pages
Publisher: Carina Press
Purchasing Info:Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book Depository

Born to Roam

Mitch Kowalski lives out of a suitcase—and he likes it that way. Traveling for work has the added bonus of scaring off women who would otherwise try to tie him down. But when he’s called home to help with running the family lodge, he’s intrigued by the new girl in town and her insistence that she doesn’t need a man—for anything. If there’s one thing Mitch can’t resist, it’s a challenge, especially a beautiful one.

Looking for Home

After a nomadic childhood, Paige Sullivan is finally putting down roots. Determined to stand on her own two feet, she lives by the motto men are a luxury, not a necessity. But when Mr. Tall, Dark and Hot pulls up a stool in her diner and offers her six weeks of naughty fun with a built-in expiration date, she’s tempted to indulge.

Mitch won’t stay put for a woman, and Paige won’t chase after a man—they’re the perfect match for a no-strings fling. Until they realize the amazing sex has become anything but casual…

If you like contemporary romance and you haven’t met Shannon Stacey’s Kowalski Family series, what are you waiting for? The Kowalski family are just plain fun. You’ll either want to be adopted by them, or marry one of them, after reading Exclusively Yours, the first book in the series.  (I wasn’t all that fond of book number two, Undeniably Yours, but I loved Yours to Keep, book three)

Ms. Stacey really needs to do a family tree of the Kowalskis, just so we can keep everyone straight. Sean, the hero of Yours to Keep, is the brother of Mitch, the “He” in the title of All He Ever Needed. Joe and Kevin, the heroes of the first two books, are their cousins. It’s all one big mostly happy family.

In All He Ever Needed, Ms. Stacey tells the kind of story she does best, a contemporary romance about two adults who have loved and lost and need to find their way through a little bit of pain to a place where they can find their happily ever after in a small town that’s willing to become their home.

In this case, it’s Mitch Kowalski, home to take care of his brother Josh and help fix up the family B&B in Whitford, Maine. A town where everyone remembers every girl Mitch ever kissed (or more) and every prank he ever pulled. Mitch owns his own company now but no one in Whitford ever seems to remember that. He’s back until they get the family’s Northern Star Lodge and Josh back on their respective feet.

Paige Sullivan owns the Trailside Diner. Her car broke down in Whitford, and she just stayed. She’s finally found a place where she belongs, just for herself. Owning the diner has made her put down roots, and she believes it’s kept her from becoming the kind of woman her mother is, chasing one man after another, suppressing her own personality to fit whoever she thinks she loves.

Mitch figures that while he’s in town he’ll have a fling with someone, on his usual terms, no strings, no ties, no tears when he leaves.

Paige doesn’t date. Not anyone. Not in the entire two years she’s been in Whitford.

Mitch tempts her off the wagon. After all, they both know the rules. Until they both break them.

Escape Rating A:  If you love small-town romances, or even think you might, get Shannon Stacey. If you liked any of the first series, you’ll love this one. Whitford is a terrific place, and she’s started a whole bunch of interesting stories that I can’t wait to find out how they resolve. But this one, this one was just so good. Paige has made a good life for herself, and you can see how she wants to make it work. Mitch has been running so fast, he doesn’t know what he really wants. Their chemistry absolutely sizzles and steams, but they take it slow, and for good reasons. Everyone knows the name of every girl Mitch ever slept with in town, and they’re all still smiling. Readers will be smiling at the end of the book, too.

I want to find out how the other stories in town turn out. All He Ever Desired and All He Ever Dreamed are coming out in October and November so I thankfully won’t have long to wait.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

The Sunday Post AKA What’s On My (Mostly Virtual) Nightstand? 9-9-12

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | The Sunday Post> Virtual Nightstand

In theory, it’s Fall. I say theory, because in Atlanta, it’s still way up into the 80s. On that chilly other hand, my friends in Alaska tell me that the first overnight frosts of the season have been reported, right on time.

Loved the summers, hated the winters. Atlanta and Florida are the other way around. Clearly I need to find a happy medium.

Speaking of happy mediums, let’s recap last week’s reviews:

A- Review: Garment of Shadows (Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes #12) by Laurie R. King
A- Review: Wicked As They Come (Blud #1) by Delilah S. Dawson
B+ Review: Senator, Mine (All Mine #1) by Kerry Adrienne
B- Review: Druid, Mine (All Mine #2) by Kerry Adrienne
B Review: Trust Your Eyes by Linwood Barclay
C+ Review: Blind Traveler Down a Dark River by Robert P. Bennett

But that was last week and this is, well, this week. The Labor Day holiday is over. No more long weekends until Thanksgiving, at least for those of us in the States.

But there’s still a lot to look forward to. So many books, so little time. Isn’t that on a t-shirt somewhere?

After Monday’s Ebook Review Central (this week the feature is Dreamspinner’s July titles) I have a couple of tours on tap.

Wednesday’s guest will be Lia Davis, because she’s on tour to promote her latest book, Ravished Before Sunrise. I will confess that the 1Night Stand series is kind of a secret vice, (not so secret now) so it’s great whenever one of their authors does a tour. They’re always fun reads, and Ravished Before Sunrise was no exception.

Thursday is a real treat. I love science fiction romance, and Heather Long has written a fantastic start to a new science fiction romance series. Yesterday’s Heroes mixes science fiction with superheroes and even time-travel for something really, really cool. So I’m very excited that she’s my guest for an interview and I had a chance to review Yesterday’s Heroes. I hope this first book in her Boomers series is the start of something big.

And looking ahead to next week, I’ll have one of the most interesting combinations I’ve seen in a while. Vampires and cowboys. Together. Specifically, Blood and Whiskey by Clark Hays and Kathleen McFall, the second book in their Cowboy and Vampire series. Clark and Kathleen are on tour, and they answered a bunch of my interview questions. I’ve got both books to look forward to for next week.

But first, this week, Shannon Stacey’s All He Ever Needed. Yes, that’s right. The fourth book in her Kowalski Family series is out on Monday and I’ve got a review copy (I have to review it for Library Journal). Expect a review on Reading Reality on Tuesday!

What are you up to this week? How’s your fall shaping up?

 

Stacking the Shelves (16) Dragon*Con Edition

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Stacking the Shelves

This would be Stacking the Shelves, the Dragon*Con edition.  I say it’s the Dragon*Con edition for a couple of reasons.

The first is simply because I was at Dragon*Con over Labor Day weekend, and didn’t do a Stacking the Shelves post.  Romance at Random started their Labor Day Blog Hop, and Reading Reality was a participant. There’s still plenty of time to enter, so hop on over to the post and take a look at the giveaway.

About Dragon*Con. Downtown Atlanta looked like it had been invaded by aliens. I’ve been to big cons (Chicago holds three a year) but nothing like this. 50,000+ fen is a lot of fen. (For those unfamiliar, fen is the collective noun for science fiction fans)

While I did go to a couple of media tie-in events (any Mythbusters fans in here?) there were a bunch of authors I wanted to see. Mercedes Lackey and Katherine Kurtz in particular. I’ve been reading both their signature series since Arrows of the Queen and Deryni Rising, respectively. It was awesome to see them in person.

And great to meet authors whose books I have reviewed, like James R. Tuck. He was terrific, and I think even remembered my review. I’m pretty I’m going to finally review Blood and Silver this week. Damn it was good.

Speaking of his reading, he had all his friends who were authors also read from their books, so I picked up Delilah S. Dawson’s Wicked as they Come from her at that panel. And started it immediately, finished it and reviewed it this week. Decadently delicious.

So what delicious books have you added to your stacks this week?

For Review:
When Snow Falls (Whiskey Creek #2) by Brenda Novak
Wife for Hire by Christine Bell
Thrones of Desire: Erotic Tales of Swords, Mist and Fire edited by Mitzi Szereto
The Scientific Sherlock Holmes by James O’Brien
Daring Greatly by Brené Brown
City of Dark Magic by Magnus Flyte
All He Ever Needed (Kowalski Family #4) by Shannon Stacey
Racing With the Wind (Agents of the Crown #1) by Regan Walker
The Cowboy and the Vampire by Clark Hays and Kathleen McFall
The Walnut Tree by Charles Todd
Forge (Thrall Web #1) by T.K. Anthony
Spice and Smoke (Bollywood Confidential #1) by Suleikha Snyder
Spice and Secrets (Bollywood Confidential #2) by Suleikha Snyder
Babylon Confidential by Claudia Christian
Clean (Mindspace Investigations #1) by Alex Hughes (print)
Operation: Endgame (When the Mission Ends #1) by Christi Snow
A Date with Death (1Night Stand) by Louisa Bacio
Forty Shades of Pearl by Arianne Richmonde
Seven Nights in a Rogue’s Bed (Sons of Sin #1) by Anna Campbell
Rapture (Bel Dame Apocrypha #3) by Kameron Hurley

Purchased:
Interview with a Jewish Vampire by Erica Manfred (free)
My Vampire Cover Model by Karyn Gerrard
The Lost Night (Rainshadow #2, Harmony #9) by Jayne Castle
Wicked As They Come (Blud #1) by Delilah S. Dawson (print, signed by the author at Dragon*Con)
Thieftaker (Thieftaker Chronicles #1) by D.B. Jackson (print, signed by the author at Dragon*Con)
Intentional Abduction (Alien Abduction #2) by Eve Langlais (free to Dragon*Con attendees!)

Review: Blind Traveler Down a Dark River by Robert P. Bennett

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | book reviews> C Reviews
Format read: ebook provided by the author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genre: Mystery
Series: Douglas Abledan #1
Length: 204 pages
Publisher: PublishAmerica
Purchasing Info:Author’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble

Douglas Abledan is a blind man using a GPS unit to navigate the world. One day the device malfunctions. He stumbles upon the scene of a murder about to take place. Due to the confusion caused by the failure of his technology, it isn’t until he hears a radio announcer reporting an accidental shooting that pieces start falling into place. Unable to convince authorities to look into the matter, he launches his own investigation. In the year 2021 increasing global earthquakes threaten civilizationas infrastructure. Unimat Incorporated is trying to stop the destruction by introducing a new building material. Special interests are up in arms. Environmentalists blame technology for the problem and want a different solution. Steel workers worry about jobs and safety. Now someone has hired a contract killer to stop the project. How can Abledan expose the killer without becoming a target?

Blind Traveler Down a Dark River is a near-future murder mystery. I wanted to settle into following the amateur detective as he solved the mystery, but the near-future part kept tugging at my willing suspension of disbelief until it got partially resolved. Why? Because the reason for the murder hinged on it.

The reader needs to accept that this near-future earth is close enough in time that the 1990s GPS satellites are still used as a historical touchpoint, but earthquakes have increased in frequency all over the planet, and faultlines that are currently dormant, have become violently active.

It turns out that the earth’s magnetic poles have reversed. Again. A once every 700,000 years or so event. But okay, I read science fiction. I can go with this. It’s an explanation. I just needed it a little sooner in the book than half-way through.

Back to the story. About those GPS satellites…take GPS technology and imagine how far it can go into the future. What if everything had an active GPS tag, including moving vehicles.  Including people. If cars could sense other cars, buildings, and people, then cars wouldn’t need drivers. Driver-less taxis and buses.

Personal GPS devices. Personal navigators for the blind. Better than any cane, even one with radio and sonic devices. Not as cuddly as a dog, but with a much longer life expectancy.

What happens if the programming on the navigator glitches, and gets its signals from the wrong street? A person might walk into traffic instead of away from it. A person might “witness” a murder they didn’t see. And no one would believe them.

That’s what happens to Douglas Abledan. A blind computer genius who figures out that the event he witnessed was a murder, and not the drive-by shooting the police claim it was. Abledan knows all about drive-by shootings, and exactly how much, or how little effort the police put into solving them. He lost his sight in a drive-by shooting.

He’s compelled to solve this murder. No matter what it takes. And no matter how much his  lack of sight, lack of experience, and lack of resources hamper his investigation.

Then there’s the murder he’s investigating. Earthquakes can be devastating, particularly when they are hitting densely populated areas that contain buildings that were never intended to be earthquake-resistant. People are dying (Think of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and move the devastation to 21st century New York City. Groan loudly for emphasis)

But changing construction materials and methods always causes disruption to jobs. A lot of power and money is involved. Secret government project money, environmental protest groups and union bosses afraid that union members will lose out if new materials use different processes. There’s more than enough motives for murder.

Abledan is going up against some very big boys and girls. And he can’t even see them coming to get him.

Escape Rating C+: The setup is interesting, once you get past trying to figure out when this takes place and how the world got into the fix it’s in. I had the feeling that the author had some very cool ideas, and needed certain tech in place to make them work. As a reader, I just needed to know how the world got that way much earlier.

Douglas Abledan is an amateur detective who gets caught up in the thrill of the chase. As such, he’s a member of a long line of private eyes, no matter how ironic that moniker might be in his case. For this series to continue Abledan needs to have a few more people to interact with who are a little more sympathetic than Speckler, the researcher who helps him figure out some of the ins and outs of his Navigator.

I found the reasons for the murder all too believable, with or without the near-future technology. But then, human nature doesn’t change. What made the story different was the detective. Douglas Abledan working both with his limitations, and rising above them. Also his determination to solve this crime, because his own case was never resolved.

Abledan’s amateur sleuthing continues, and gets more wrapped in the problems of the near-future world he inhabits, when he goes on vacation to Chicago in Blind Traveler’s Blues. Take a look at my review on Book Lovers Inc for the details of how earthquakes in the Windy City, murder and eco-terrorism, stir up more adventures.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Interview with Author Kerry Adrienne on Time Travel and One Night Stands

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Author Interviews> Author Q&A> blog tours

I’d like to welcome Kerry Adrienne to Reading Reality. This very busy lady is the author of the utterly delicious All Mine time-travel mini-series nestled inside Decadent Publishing’s, let’s just say it, totally decadent, One Night Stand erotic romance series. I had the pleasure of reading the first two books in Ms. Adrienne’s series,  Senator, Mine and Druid, Mine, and they were short and tasty treats (See my reviews of Senator and Druid to get a taste of just how delish!) . I’m definitely looking forward to Pharoah, Mine, due out in October.)

Until we can read about that Pharoah, let’s hear from Kerry about her take on time-travel romance…

Marlene: Hello, Kerry! Can you please tell us a bit about yourself? What’s your life all about when you’re not writing?

Kerry: Hi! Well, I work a lot! I am an Associate Editor at Entangled Publishing, and Managing Editor of the Covet line. I teach classes at a local college. Hmm. I sew (I’m a costumer), paint, play guitar… I love my five cats and would have more if hubby wouldn’t blow a gasket. 🙂 My main job, though, is mom to three daughters.

Marlene: Your All Mine series are all time-travel romances. What is it about time-travel romance that attracted you to the genre?

Kerry: I love history—I love researching and then pondering what life would be like to live in another time. I’m just fascinated by what the “everyman’s” life was like in different time periods.

Marlene: Senator, Mine and Druid, Mine are both part of the 1Night Stand series. How easy or difficult was it to squeeze each whole love story into just one night?

Kerry: Not easy at all. *Laugh*.  I could have written a lot more, but the point of the series is a quick read.

Marlene: What inspired you to choose the particular time periods that you did for your Senator, Druid and forthcoming Pharoah? And what was the research like for each period?

Kerry: Well, I minored in Classical Studies, so it’s a natural choice to pick those times. When researching, I would often lose myself for hours—completely forgetting I was actually going to write about the time period.

Marlene: Describe a typical day of writing? Are you a planner or pantser?

Kerry: Right now, there really isn’t a typical day—but I am working on a schedule. My youngest just went off to Kindergarten this year, so I have more time in the day to work. Sometimes I don’t write as much as I would like because my job keeps me busy. I am definitely trying to figure out a balance—and for me, that means a pretty rigid schedule.

Marlene: Who first introduced you to the love of reading?

Kerry: My aunt. She pointed me to her collection of Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys—and I dug right in.

Marlene: Who influenced your decision to become a writer? 

Kerry: Wow, that is tough. Lots of people. I don’t even know where to begin.

Marlene: What book do you recommend everyone should read and why? 

Kerry: *one* book? Ouch. Well, I think A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is pretty inspiring. 🙂

Marlene: Will there be more books in this series? (I’m really looking forward to Pharaoh, Mine) What upcoming projects do you have on your schedule that you’d like to share? 

Kerry: I hope to write another, yes. As time allows. Right now, I have six other projects on my plate—and not enough hours in the day.

Marlene: Coffee or Tea? 

Kerry: Tea—usually. But I love coffee, too.

A tea-drinking, history major who is staff to five cats. Kerry, you sound like my kind of writer! No wonder I enjoyed Druid, Mine and Senator, Mine…Pharoah, Mine should be a treat. 

Thanks so much, Kerry for answering all my questions!

Bookish Rant: Apple, Amazon, Anti-Trust and the DOJ

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Bookish Rant or Raves> Originally published at Book Lovers, Inc.> The Rocket Lover

I was at Dragon*Con over Labor Day weekend. For those either not in the U.S., or who aren’t familiar with Science Fiction Fandom, two explanations are in order. Labor Day weekend is the first weekend in September.

Dragon*Con is a huge regional science fiction convention in downtown Atlanta, Georgia. When I say huge, I mean attendance that numbers well over 30,000. Downtown Atlanta looks like it’s been overrun by aliens.

30,000 plus people talk about a LOT of stuff. Some of it frivolous, but a lot of it book-related. I listened to/met/shook hands with some of my favorite authors.

On Sunday morning, among about a dozen other panels, two lawyers and an author tackled the seriously bookish topic of the “Apple eBooks Lawsuit”. The room was packed to the rafters.

If you are looking for a basic but excellent primer on the entire price fixing lawsuit that the U.S. Department of Justice filed against Apple and five of the big six publishers (Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Simon & Schuster and Penguin), you can’t do better than this excellent summary at Dear Author. Jane Little is a lawyer and she has not only summarized the original case beautifully, but she’s continued to cover the whole farrago as it’s kept on morphing.

Back to the panel at Dragon*Con. The lawyer who discussed the case was an anti-trust specialist, and she went into the case by talking about U.S. anti-trust law. Her take on the whole thing was pretty clear. The law is that competitors in a particular market, in this case Hachette, HarperCollins, etc., and Apple, cannot legally get together and talk about prices, whether they actually set prices or not. But in this case they did set prices, making the whole thing worse for them from a legal standpoint.

There is no provision in the law for a “greater good” being served. Also, as romance author Courtney Milan so eloquently wrote in her blog recently, there is no exemption from anti-trust law for being a special snowflake. Just read her post titled Your Unspecial Anti-Trust Snowflake. It’s a nutshell takedown of all the objections by all the defendants in one easy-to-read gulp.

But what fascinated me was the perspective of the author on the panel, who shall remain nameless (yes, I do remember who it was). Her contention was that Amazon needs to be stopped, now, for the things they will do, later, when they achieve even greater power in the market.

Amazon has a tremendous amount of power in the ebook and also the book marketplace. Because they are successful. Jeff Bezos didn’t listen when everyone laughed at him a number of years ago. When everyone said that people wouldn’t buy books (and other stuff) online. When everyone said that people wouldn’t read ebooks. We all know now how both those predictions turned out. But Amazon could have failed. Amazon has reaped the rewards of betting on what was absolutely not a sure thing.

Now Amazon has a giant share of print book distribution, and a dominant share of ebook distribution. Recent statistics show that we’ve reached the tipping point on ebooks. Ebooks are now THE dominant sales format for adult fiction; bigger than hardcover, bigger than paperback. Amazon is also a publisher.

The argument was that the publishers all behaved so badly, even illegally, in order to prevent Amazon from doing something even more terrible with all that power.

Of course, what the publishers did with that power in the short run was break Amazon’s stranglehold on ebook prices, and the immediate effect was that ebook prices rose.  Consumers did not benefit from those higher prices.

What stuck with me was that the arguments to do something about Amazon now were based on something they might do in the future.

We don’t know what they might do in the future. Amazon is a very powerful company right now. (So, for that matter, is Apple!) But asking the government, any government, to punish a company, or an individual, for what they might do is always a bad precedent.

Amazon might do good things. They might do bad things. They might get fat, dumb and happy. Microsoft used to be feared for how big and near-monopolistic they were, and look where they are now. New disruptive technologies will come along, and Amazon might be too happy with their status quo to jump on the new bandwagon (which is a lot of what is going on with the big six publishers right now).

But laws punish acts, not thoughts. What we do, not what others believe we might do. Let’s not even think of going there. Oh wait, somebody already did. His name was George Orwell, and his book about the Thought Police is so famous that Apple used it in one of their most famous commercials. That’s right. 1984.

Ironic that, wouldn’t you say?

Review: Trust Your Eyes by Linwood Barclay

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews
Format read: print book from publisher
Formats available: Hardcover, ebook, audiobook
Genre: Thriller
Length: 512 pages
Publisher: NAL Hardcover
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book Depository

Thomas Kilbride is a map-obsessed schizophrenic so affected that he rarely leaves the self-imposed bastion of his bedroom. But with a computer program called Whirl360.com, he travels the world while never stepping out the door. That is until he sees something in a street view of downtown New York City. Thomas’s keen eyes have detected an image in a window…an image that looks like a woman being murdered.
Thomas’s brother, Ray, takes care of him, cooking for him, dealing with the outside world on his behalf, and listening to his intricate and increasingly paranoid theories. When Thomas tells Ray what he has seen, Ray humors him with a half-hearted investigation. But Ray soon realizes he and his brother have stumbled onto a deadly conspiracy.
And now they are in the crosshairs…

There will be an inevitable comparison to the movie Rain Man.  But Ray Kilbride is in no way as self-centered at Tom Cruise’s character in the movie. And Thomas is a lot more functional than Dustin Hoffman’s. In the end, also more self-centered.

But if we’re talking about movies, think of Trust Your Eyes as Rear Window crossed with Google Earth, viewed by a map-obsessed shut-in. Thomas Kilbride could go out, but he doesn’t. He thinks he’s working for the CIA, memorizing cities in the event of an unspecified computer viral pandemic that will wipe out all the GPS systems in one swell foop.

While the computer virus and the CIA assignment are illusionary, or delusional, Thomas Kilbride’s map memorization capabilities are all too real. And do we really know what Google sees when it maps our streets? Whose car is parked in which driveway in the middle of the day when it shouldn’t be?

Thomas Kilbride sees a murder. In New York City. Several months ago. And no one believes him because people are all too used to not believing Thomas Kilbride. After all, Thomas thinks that Bill Clinton phones him every night for updates. Yes, that Bill Clinton.

But after Ray comes home to figure out what to do about Thomas after their father dies in a rather suspicious lawn mower accident, things start to unravel. Thomas convinces Ray to take a printout of that possible murder to New York, just to take a look at the scene. Ray has a meeting in NYC, so he thinks he’ll humor his brother.

The thing is…there really was a murder. And the killers had no idea that their crime has been posted on the internet for anyone to see. Anyone obsessive that is.

All they knew was that it was a totally botched job, one that they’ve covered up as much as possible, and have been waiting for months to see if anyone would come snooping around.

Ray Kilbride just snooped. Because his brother was obsessive about maps. Now everyone’s world is about to come crashing down.

Maybe someone should have listened to Thomas a little sooner.

Escape Rating B: Because Ray is genuinely a nice guy who is in over his head, the reader does feel for him. He wants to do the right thing, and Thomas is a challenge, to say the least. His father just died, the circumstances are weird, and Ray is stuck. He’s a freelance political cartoonist, so he can take some time to figure things out, but not much.

Thomas can’t be totally on his own, but he is fairly high-functioning. Also very self-centered. He can be reasoned with, up to a point. Late in the book, his condition is defined as schizophrenia, but I wonder if there’s more to it.

There are two parallel lines to the plot, and they eventually meet. Thomas sees a murder. One line is the track of convincing someone, poor Ray, to look into it and the results. The other half is the murder itself, what happened and why. The plot, motivations and people on the side of the “bad guys” was less clearly drawn for this reader than the Kilbride side.

Of course, the murder was very badly planned and executed and we’re not meant to sympathize, but I just didn’t get the motivations of the perpetrators as well, and that side of the story seemed a bit choppy.

At the end there was one last piece of business. Ray was still puzzled about his dad’s death. The solution to that final puzzle, that, that sent chills up my spine.

***Disclaimer: I was compensated for this BlogHer Book Club review but all opinions expressed are my own.