The Taking of Eden by Robin Alexander

The Taking of Eden by Robin Alexander

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I start off by noting that I am unsure how to rate this work. I’m fluctuating between 3.75 and 4.35, and saying ‘so I’ll pick 4 stars’ just doesn’t feel right for some reason.

This is one of this author’s early works – back when different genres, styles, etc. were being played with and it shows. Well, I do not mean this book is all over the place, it isn’t really. It’s just that it doesn’t really read like a Robin Alexander book. Mind there are unexpected flashes of humor that remind me of later books, but this work was never intended to be a work of humor. Its angsty, and psychological, and drama-filled, with crime and a bit of thrills here and there mixed in as well.

The book is called ‘Taking of Eden’, I mention the title so I can then say – one of the main characters is actually named Eden. Eden Carlton. (view spoiler)[Eden is an incredibly rich accomplished woman, who spends most of her time working, or at home – the fancy dress parties and the like are not her thing. She has few friends, and no living relative to speak of (though she is close to her grandfather’s friend). (hide spoiler)] I mention all of this because it leads to the set-up of the story. Though the reader doesn’t know this going in, so maybe I shouldn't mention all of this, eh? I’ll add some spoiler tags and resume.

The reader of the book both does and doesn’t meet Eden at the beginning. Does because she’s there, but she’s not the main character in the beginning. No, that’d be Jamie Spencer, a nurse who got tired of the life and death found in hospitals and moved into working at a mental health facility. The McManus facility – a private one that caters to the rich, and is deeply concerned about privacy and confidentiality.

On her first day at this facility, Jamie is shown a particular patient – one intrigues her. No, this is not a book about a mental health nurse who becomes involved with a mentally ill patient inside a hospital. She becomes intrigued because of how much different that woman is being treated – only the supervising nurse is allowed access to her chart and only one doctor works with the patient. And anyone who asks questions about the patient gets run out of the building.

The book description is misleading. One of the reasons I was reluctant to read this book, beyond knowing it was an early Alexander book and highly unlikely to be humorous, was the book description. Well – ‘Murder and betrayal send three women fleeing for their lives deep into the woods of the Carolinas’ – isn’t exactly inaccurate but . . . is misleading for reasons I can’t really explain without spoiler tags being used.

Another character of importance is Holly – another nurse at the facility. She’s an important character, but not a POV character (the POV swings around a lot, and I mean a lot, so maybe she is at some point during the main section of the book). She’s one of the other people who notice the strange activities going on with that specific patient and both of them investigate the matter – both Holly and Jamie.

I liked this book a lot more than I did the other early Alexander books. Though mentioning ‘early’ reminds me why I give authors so much wiggle room – why I give them 3 to 5 books for me to come to a decision about them. If I’d read the first three books by Alexander, and only those three, I’d likely never have read another. And yet . . . bah, this isn’t a topic for this specific book. Though it made me look – first book I read by Alexander, no I mean by publication so let’s restart. First book published by Alexander that I read I gave a 1.5 star rating, then this book here, which is around 4 stars, then a 3.75 star book then a 4.75 star book . . . um, let’s pretend this paragraph never existed, or change the ‘if I’d only read the first three’ to ‘first book’).

Course this isn’t the 3rd or even second book I’ve read by this author, but the 27th (not counting rereads, which would raise things to … hmm, that number isn’t right I don’t think, looks closer; I’ve reread 4 of Alexander books, so this would be my 31st book read counting rereads). I do not remember the point of this paragraph.

Right, so, I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would.

Rating: 4.08

May 13 2018



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Survival Instincts by May Dawney

Survival Instincts by May Dawney

My rating: 4.4 of 5 stars


*I received this book from Ylva Publishing for an honest review*

This was one of those dense rich stories that took a while to read. If I recall correctly, and I might not, there was a similar denseness/richness in the short story I read by this same author – the only other work I’ve read by them. ‘What does that mean?’ Um . . . hmms. Boiled down: there’s a lot of ‘stuff’ packed into the words/actions/scenes. Right. So.

This story, entirely seen through the perspective of one character, Lynn Tanner, is a future post-apocalyptic world. And the majority of the story takes place in New York (well, all of it, really, just there’s references to Lynn having been elsewhere, like ‘up north’ in Canada). It is unclear what exactly happened – there are references to ‘bombs falling’ but this story takes place centuries later and I’m not sure Lynn herself knows what happened. I pause here to insert a paragraph as this reminded me.

There are two specific things I had ‘trouble with’, which were ‘problematic’. First is easy enough to mention – I despised all side characters, who were basically one step away from being evil, with the possible exception of Toby – no, strike that, he was way too loud to survive – and was a massive liability. Though some of the side characters grew on me, mostly Dani Wilson. Right, with that out of the way let’s get to the second major specific trouble spot – remember how I mentioned this is a future world, and that Lynn herself might not know what happened? Well . . . that was a mixed bag type of thing. There were things she knew, things she didn’t know, and it didn’t always make sense – considering this sometime in the future after a traumatic event, that’s somewhat reasonable. Some weird and wacky things get remembered, other things get lost. This area she’s in had once been called ‘New York’? Sure, reasonable for that to either get remembered or forgotten. Was remembered here. Remembering that a particular type of building was an ‘office building’ when their culture, their being the centuries later people living on earth, eh, okay. Remember a certain area was the ‘receptionist area’ . . . um, really? Seriously? She ‘learned’ this fact from someone? Who learned it . . . how exactly? Bah, sorry, as I said, some things get remembered that are wacky to remember, and maybe this is just one of those wacky things. But Lynn’s ability to ‘know’ the world around her was oddly off and on – like ‘knowing’ that a particular area was the receptionist area, and not knowing what a zebra is. That’s the off and on – there’s parts where she calls them zebras, and other times calling them weirdly colored stripped horses (and hey, what are zebras but stripped horses, eh?). I suppose here it’s more an off and on on what she called the zebras.

Which leads me to: one of the things I had to remind myself almost immediately is the fact that I’m reading a story set far (ish, it’s unclear how far in the future) into the future and the people and whatever culture cannot really have ‘our’ (as in 21st century) ideas forced upon them. Or, more specifically, for a while there I was thinking that Lynn was quite immature for her stated age, and seemed to be acting more on the level of a teenager (as did most of the others), until I recalled that she was – in ways, quite immature – and quite mature. Depending on the thing talked about. I think I messed up noting what I wanted to note. Basically I needed to, initially, remind myself that I wasn’t reading about characters living in my own time period, and that I couldn’t put my own time period standards and stuff onto them. This is way too many words. I move on.

Lynn has lived the vast majority of her life as someone who wanders the wilds – as someone Dani Wilson’s people call ‘Wilders’. As opposed to Wilson’s people who Lynn called ‘Settlers’. Lynn had a mother and father and . . . let’s not reveal the whole plot here, eh? Lynn has lived in the wilds most of her life and is now something like 39. While looking for food she hears something in the distance and creeps closer. Watches as a group of humans ‘take down’ an elephant. She remains hidden until she can’t – for the dog she’s with charges forward to get into the fight. And Lynn runs out to get her dog. Whereupon she’s almost immediately tackled, pummeled and almost killed by some kid. For . . . reasons. One thing leads to another and Lynn’s now these other humans captive. Based entirely on the dog – for, you see, the other humans know this dog – it’s the dog that had been with the scout that they had sent out – the scout who isn’t around anywhere. How’d Lynn get the dog? Did she kill Richard?

Eventually, after 99% of the settlers show how much of a dick they can be, Lynn meets up again with Queen Bitch (who had been off doing something or other), Kate. Who tells Lynn to lead them to Richard, the dead guy, or Lynn will die. One thing leads to another, and before you can say boo . . . Lynn’s in a closet like it’s a cage. Then later off on a journey with one of the settlers, Dani.

And that’s the story the book tells. The quest of Dani and Lynn to retrieve a dead body in the wilds of post-apocalyptic New York. Lynn is wild and, at times, feral. But the settlers, as . . . well I didn’t show did I, well, they aren’t as civilized as they might appear.

I liked the story of Lynn and Dani. Though Dani really comes off quite badly in this story. It seemed like every time you turned around let’s reveal another bad personality trait of Dani’s. But, meh, she was still okay-ish.

I liked the book and enjoyed it. For those wanting to know – there’s a bit of romance, a lot of action/adventure/thrills, a bit of sex (here or there, barely), and . . . ums, stuff.

One last bit: Warning, there are scenes that occur in this book that you do not want to read while eating food.

Rating: 4.44

March 9 2018




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Huntress by A.E. Radley

Huntress by A.E. Radley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I hadn't looked too closely at the story when I first spotted this book and started to drool over it. Based on some comments I'd seen, a few glimpses from reviews, ratings, etc. So I watched as the days to publication counted down, knowing mostly that this book involved loads of humor. But not really much else (my fault, and somehow I took everything I'd glimpsed, combined it with the book cover, and came up with the insane idea that this might be a humorous fantasy/horror book - I mean, come on, the cover looks like a zombie/werewolf/vampire is creeping up on a car driving along - and, quite frankly, now that I look at it, completely confuses me for being on the cover of this book (the 'fleeing couple' (they aren't a couple but best friends, one lesbian, other straight) ditched the car early on, and everyone chasing them did so, for the most part, with access to modern technology - as in, the fleeing people were afoot, chasing people were acar. So . . . what's with the cover?).

Right, sorry. All I meant to do was say something like: things I had read made me think this would be a humorous lark, maybe vampire related. Took me awhile to realize this was a spy caper. I mean, the book starts off with a coffee shop worker talking to some incompetent police about a missing woman. She doesn't actually know anything about the woman except for the name 'Cara', some kind of 'Spanish' vibe, and that she'd been coming in the shop every work day for 10 months, except for three days ago when she didn't pop in. And is therefore missing. See, I'd been thinking - ooh, I know, she'd been turned into a vampire, like, yeah. That's why she couldn't come in the morning? No - I'd entered this via the wrong genre. This isn't a fantasy/horror doofus. mmphs. Stupid me. Stupid.

Right, so, what is this about? A woman of exactly 25 has great schooling 'but' works as a coffee shop worker because it's safe and pays the minimal bills. She's been flirting for ten months with one of her customers named Cara. Until she wasn't because Cara poofed on her. So, as noted, she told the police. Who didn't give two shits about it. So Amy, the 25 year old is named Amy by the way, decided to investigate the matter herself. So she looks at the video tapes. Mostly to try to pick up on the woman's license plate on the car. Saw how incredibly obvious her flirting was. Also saw that the woman always seemed to park in the same spot which hid the license plate. Also saw that the woman had, at the very least, been using her. Distracting her with mild flirtation while she hid something under one of the tables. She also saw that whatever she had been hiding under the tables for 10 months had: 1) been picked up by 'spiky' so named because of his 'bad hair'; and 2) whatever she'd been hiding, one of those 'things' was still under one of the tables (the 'wrong' table).

Amy looks. Finds USB thingy. Before she can investigate further the spiky haired guy is in her face demanding to know if she had found any USB drives. Because he lost one. Amy lies and says no (which, on the face of it, didn't mean anything right then and there, but now that I've read the book and know that Amy is quite horrible at lying and incapable of doing anything but telling the truth . . . changes that scene in my mind). Man leaves. May or may not believe her. She goes back to the back area, retrieves her laptop (there’s a story there why she has it at work – and why she has a massive camping bag – she and her friend were going to go camping in a test run thing, and after one time she forgot her knickers, she wasn’t going to forget anything ever again, and I mean anything). Plugs the USB into the laptop and . . . before you can say boo, the man pops in and screams at her to give him the USB drive. Mentions several things. She flees. He chases. Her friend Kerry pops up (since they were going to meet there shortly). Man pulls the friend into the crisis. Then police show up, or at least people looking police like with weapons. Amy and Kerry then duck into the ladies (as, obviously, a spy wanting something from you wouldn’t dare follow you into the ladies, right?). And then proceed to continue in their fleeing.

They end up on a train. Then off a train. Then camping. Then . . . well, more fleeing.

Meanwhile other characters are introduced to the story. We have an older fella at MI5 who is tasked with investigating this case. Not immediately obvious but I think part of his scenes actually were set before the USB disk was found. Then scenes in which he hires an ex-MI5 person to track the two women, Amy and Kerry. And she, Claudia, does. All over the place. Driving. Sleeping in car. Driving.

To add to the confusion, Amy, as hinted at earlier, simply can’t stop from being honest. So she basically tells any and every one that she meets that they are on the run from the police. Naturally . . ..

If I had gone into this story correctly, there’s a good chance that I might have ended up on 5 stars. For one, I expected an hilarious romp, whatever genre we were actually going to be in. Some funny moments here and there, but no. This is not an hilarious romp. Soooo…..

Right, last thought: for those looking for romance, yes that trickles in. And no it does not involve ‘spoiler’ (view spoiler)[Cara and Amy (hide spoiler)].

Rating: 4.55

June 26 2017




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Right Out of Nowhere by Laurie Salzler

Right Out of Nowhere by Laurie Salzler

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I hate when I ‘forget’ to write a review immediately after reading a book. A book without a review isn’t a sign of anything other than that I didn’t have time to write anything. It is neither a good or bad sign.

Heh – I have two reviews to write and I’m now debating on which to now talk about since that above opening would work on either book. *thinks*

I’ve read all but two of Salzler’s books, which means I’ve now read four. I tend to enjoy the books, though not go into fits of insane gibberish bursts of extreme joy that leads me to pound on the 5 star button.

I could tell you, whoever I mean by ‘you’, immediately one of the reasons for the lack of five stars, but it seems somewhat unfair to start with negatives so I’ll immediately note: I really liked how there was a bit of ‘dangerous outdoor action’ that occurred in this book and it did not, I repeat did not involve wacky insane people who either are hunting and/or stumble across two women thrust together into danger and survival. Okay, went a little far there – I just was going to note that I liked how you can inject some thrilling action/adventure/danger without having to have ‘evil people’ doing evil crap. You can just have people impacted by nature, be it weather or lions (mountain or did they call it a bobcat?).

Okay, that negative thing I was going to mention then pushed – I really really did not like the dynamic that was displayed between the brother and sister in this book. Or how a grown woman seems still to be under the thumb of her father (‘father said I could have the big bed’; ‘No *throws a tantrum* I don’t want someone else to join us up here as an extra SAR person!!! *pfft* Fine father, whatever.’) I never did figure that one out – why did the father have all this power? Was he in the chain of command of the SAR people? He didn’t seem to be specifically. Just . . . connected and powerful with them. SAR – Search and Rescue.

Right, sorry again. So, the book involves and stars Roni Oatman who works as a Search and Rescue person for the Forestry Service during part of the year and . . . um . . . a rancher? during the rest of the year. The SAR part of the year is about to start when the book opens and Roni is heading up to the cabin. Her brother will be joining her – there would normally be a third member of their team, but she (and I’d have her name if I hadn’t taken forever to get around to writing a review) is heavily pregnant and about to deliver a baby. ‘She’ is also Roni brother’s wife, and – importantly – the woman who Roni first fell in love with (long before ‘She’ meet the brother) . . . and still lusts towards.

Once Roni arrives at the cabin, she finds her brother and learns that a third person would be joining them – a Selena Ayala.

Selena and Roni have an interesting first contact situation. Roni has accidentally allowed herself to be blinded by the sun, and when the two first meet Selena has to doctor Roni back to being able to see. Which takes time (days). So Roni ‘learns’ Selena before she ever first sees her in the flesh. Roni may or may not also be topless on this occasion of first meeting – I forget now, though I do know that Selena stumbled across Roni outdoors naked.

It’s been ages since I read the book so: I really liked the dynamic involved between the budding attraction and relationship between Selena and Roni; I actually liked how Roni seemed to have grown as a human as the book progressed; I like the bits of action in this book; and I really liked the relationship between Roni and her horse.

One last point before I depart – horrifyingly disagreeable exes seem to be a theme with this author. Turned up in this book as well as in others I’d read. If I recall correctly, I believe ‘borderline insane/or just plain disagreeable – nasty – exes’ appear in all of the books I’ve read. *checks* Yep – in all of the books this theme appears.

Rating: something around 4.5 since that’s the shelf I put the book on when I finished it mid-May.

June 6 2017




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A Kiss Doesn't Lie by Robin Alexander

A Kiss Doesn't Lie by Robin Alexander

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is both one of the better lesbian action/adventure/discovery books I've read and competently written. I do not believe it ranks up there with the best books put out by Alexander, though. Not sure if I'd give a rating of 3.5 or 3.75. I edge to 3.75 because of that 'one of the better' thingies I said above.

Rating: 3.5 to 3.75





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Blinded by Kim Pritekel

Blinded
by Kim Pritekel
Pages: Unknown
Date: November 15 2016
Publisher: Sapphire Books Publishing
Series: None

Review
Rating: 4.0 out of 5.0
Read: August 8 2016

*I received this book from NetGalley and Sapphire Books Publishing in return for a fair review.*

This is the second story I’ve read by this author. I had loved the first one I had read, so was quite happy to see a new one pop up. Though there was/is a certain amount of confusion generated by odd twists of fate – the nature of the previous book I had read, the cover of this current book, and the title of the current book.

I went in knowing that the book involved a rising television reporter, Burton Blinde, who was involved in a tragic accident that forced her to flee. I learned more, obviously enough, but I’ll get to that in a bit. Combining that snippet of information with the cover, shattered glass as if a bullet had been shot through it, plus wide open startled eyes, in addition to the ‘Blinded’ part of the title, and combing the first with the prior work I’d read I had this vague idea that the reporter might have been blinded by the tragic event. The prior work involved a blind report, though I believe that one was born blind.

Right, so, I’m not actually sure why the title is ‘Blinded’, nor, for that, why there is that specific cover implying someone got shot (what with the reporter who had been, relatively recently, within the last three years?, been shot while on air, combined with the shot glass, I assumed that is how Blinde would end up in that tragic accident – shot). Blinded, could be taken like when something happens that remind people of someone else, and say that they have been ‘Last Named’; or it could mean literally that someone had been blinded and are now blind. Neither works in this instance.

Why am I rambling on like this? Simple, for the longest time I wasn’t sure what exactly I was reading, where we were going. The book starts with Blinde being a rising television reporter for a local Denver television station, the kind who has acquired awards for her work. And the kind who had just secured a contract to leave that local station for the big time – with CNN. Things were advancing along, some odd little things were occurring here and there (both in terms of things that flowed with the story, unexplained post cards and vodka bottles arriving at Blinde’s work), and those things that were just odd (occasionally the point of view, I assumed, would switch and ‘things’ of no importance, nor obvious reason would be revealed (a unnamed man and woman are in an old studio and fiddle with some of the buttons and . . scene; a woman arrives in a helicopter, goes down some stairs, talks with some people and . . . scene – there was never any explanation for either scene). Then a tragic accident occurs that left a limp and other injuries (I’ll otherwise leave that vague – the injuries and the situation; though will include the bit wherein Blinde was not blinded), and Blinde flees.

Years later, while working a side job for a private investigator, she makes some comment about these odd things she had been receiving. One thing leads to another and Blinde’s off to some tiny island nation, Chilvokia, off the coast of Russia that may or may not be involved in a civil war or other war related issue.

It kind of felt like, rightly or wrongly, that something like 90% of the book was from Blinde’s point of view, though there were a few other point of views filling out the rest of the book (hmm, wording it that way, maybe Blinde had 75% of the book). One of the other points of view was a young woman by the name of Lilli, and she is the other ‘important’ character in the book. Though I believe she only first appears 22% into the book (and I’m not 100% sure that is her). Lilli has the second largest percentage of the book, though her parts were super rare, just not as rare as the few other people who got POV’s.

There was a bit of action/adventure/investigation/damsel-in-distress going on – quite interesting. Not always clear what was going on (in terms of why certain things were occurring when they occurred (though, except for two specific instances, the ‘confusing’ things were later explained), like why postcards from Chilvokia were landing on Burton’s desk; not in terms of a confusion foggy plot).

I liked the book well enough. For most of the book I had in the back of my mind that I was reading something that I’ll eventually rate between 3.8 to 4.2, and by the end found to be a good solid 4 star book.

August 8 2016

Paradox Valley by Gerri Hill

Paradox Valley
by Gerri Hill
Pages: 322
Date: August 22 2016
Publisher: Bella Books
Series: None

Review
Rating: 3.5 to 3.7
Read: September 1 2016

I'd probably rate this one somewhere around 3.5 to 3.7.

Tense. Violent. Bloody.

Something longer than this might appear in this box tomorrow.

--
This one had a lot more point of view shifts than I expected. I think the opening bunch of chapters had a new POV with each chapter. If I hadn't read the book description, I'd have been lost as to which character I was 'supposed' to be caring about (answer: all of them. But mostly Dana and Corey).

Fleeing a shocking and unexpected marriage proposal from her girlfriend of six months, 30+ year old Dana Ingram drops in on her parents and their farm in a sparsely populated area of Colorado. Tried to work the ‘works in marketing in Seattle’ in there somewhere, but couldn’t fit those words in. Her visit home pulls in her mother and a bunch of relatives; most of whom are of little importance throughout the book, though one is in it throughout (and one of the few semi-important people without their own POV – Butch, Dana’s cousin).

Meanwhile Hal and Jean, two 70+ year old people are living on their own tiny farm. Mentioned because both have POV’s that are of some importance in the story. They are, somewhat shockingly, not really, in a lesbian fiction novel, a happily married content straight couple (a thought I had more because we were still in the round robin game of musical head hoping – which one will the reader stop in last/or which of these heads being hopped in are actually important).

Turning back to Butch, he’s a local boy who never left when he reached adult age. Which I mention because he’s dating another local – a girl named Holly. The beginning kind of makes it seem she, her family, and Butch will be very important to the story-line, but only Butch is of any real importance. Though Holly, Annie Gail, and her husband Dick do have their moments on the page (I do not believe anyone actually ever calls the husband Dick by the way, I’m being self-funny).

Colonel Sutt… um. Sutter or Sutton? Dang. I can’t remember now and my Kindle is currently dead. Well, Col. S. is ‘the man in charge’ when suspicious events occur late one night and therefore has his own thoughts expressed for the reader to see. His thoughts are mainly of a raging kind.

One of Colonel S’s subordinates is a woman by the name of Corey Conaway – Captain in the . . . whichever military force she is a Captain in. Probably Army. Certainly not Air Force or Navy, or Coast Guard. Whatever. Captain Conaway, though, has been on an extended ‘special assignment’ for the past 4 or so months, which started right after her entire team was killed on a mission in Afghanistan. The special assignment consists of rolling around her cabin slowly losing weight and drowning in waves of guilt – for still being alive – also drowning in alcohol. Well, at least in the sense that she needs it to sleep.

A couple of other people are also of importance, like say Lucky the dog – super important, but I’m tired of naming people and dogs so I’ll move on.

Shortly after Dana arrived back at her parents place, they enjoy a family reunion type of BBQ. Then the scene shifts to Holly and Annie Gail’s grocery story in Paradox, the small local town. Not exactly sure why they 1) have so much ‘page time’, nor why 2) ‘stuff’ begins from their point of view. Stuff being – Holly’s whimpering about being stuck in tiny Paradox and thinks it’s finally time to move out of this tiny tiny place. She says this to her mother. As they shelf stuff. Or do inventory. Or whatever it was they were doing. The important thing is that both are near heavy cans and things in glass jars. Because – the ground is shaking! Cans are shaking! Cans and glass might shake, fall off, and brain them! Then the power goes off.

Back to Dana – ground shakes. Power goes out. Dana freaks out like she’s never in her life been involved in an earthquake like event.

Hal and Jean experience the earthquake. Stumble around trying various flashlights. Find all of them have dead batteries. Light some candles.

Dana and extended family rush around and notice their phones are dead, the cars are dead. Everything is dead! (battery powered everything). Dana continues to freak out.

Sometime later a bunch of super old dudes ride up to Hal and Jean’s house. Note that they are going to investigate the helicopter that they heard fly near and then heard crash. Hal goes along with them because . . . he didn’t’ want to look bad. Macho stuff. So the group of 70+ people bounce around on horses towards the crash site.

Dana’s freaking out.

Col. S is freaking out because his career is in trouble – since he is the one who sent the helicopter that crashed. He is getting chewed out by his boss, General Ben. I might have the General’s name wrong. No matter. The General calls in a specialist – an out of shape, PTSD suffering, probably doesn’t have the energy to crawl out of bed Captain. By the name of Conaway (they have a family connection – or I mean, the General knew Conaway’s father, and was there for her when the father died).

So – a troop is being sent in on foot to investigate the ‘meteor’ and the crash site of the helicopter. At the same time, Captain Conaway is also being sent in. By herself. In civilian clothing. With a cover story. Because. Reasons.

The first humans Conaway walks into (yes, battery powered things don’t work but you’d think they would at least give her a bicycle, or a horse/camel/donkey/ostrich, but no – foot power only) are Butch and Dana who are out investigating. Both are wary and kind of act like they’ve never meet any other human walking or riding horses before. Eventually they offer to let Conaway ride behind Dana on a really huge horse.

Butch, Dana, and Conaway ride around on horsies. Investigating stuff.

Hal and his gang of aged farmers are also bouncing around investigating.

Eventually weird stuff starts happening. Like giant arms and doorways and soulless eyes. But I do not wish to be too specific because . . . spoiler reasons.

Book had a certain spooky tenseness to it. Plus romance. And panic. And a friendly dog. To a certain extent there were a bunch of conversations that occurred that I kind of just skimmed because they were taking away from the tension. That’s to be noted – some of the tension gets deflated along the way by things like budding romance, conversations about stuff. Truth be told – I’m not sure why there needed to be so many different POV’s. But there were. So.

Right. So. Decided to give Hill another chance after the few other books I’d read. As I noted, I’d give this one a rating around 3.5 to 3.7.

September 2 2016

This is Devin Jones by Kristen Conrad

This is Devin Jones
by Kristen Conrad
Pages: 306
Date: July 14 2016
Publisher: Peckham Press
Series: None

Review
Rating: 6.0 out of 5.0
Read: August 5 2016

Wow, this one had it all. Humor, action, thrills, suspense, romance, did I mention humor? Oh, and a few scenes of graphic sex here and there.

Keeping the lesbian and gay part (Devin's best friend is a gay man), this would make one great movie. Removing that part and this still would make a great film, though it would lose a little something if it did do that, strip that part out - the LGBT part.

So, this really was a female Die Hard; a lesbian Die Hard. A cop in a terrorist situation, in a building, with explosives all over the place, and people randomly being shot. And vague mix of competent and incompetent outside helpers.

One damn good book, this be.

August 5 2016