The "Volunteer" by D.H. Jonathan

Somewhat disturbing book on several levels. From my notes as I read:

44% - "Woman being forced to wander campus naked for 2 months. One of her professors tries to take advantage, rape almost happens. She is saved. The professor forcing her to be naked then, after saving her, hugs her without permission. Then one of the helpers, 'an attractive man', kisses her without permission (though slowly and tentatively). Which part of this is ok/not ok? forced nudity? almost rape? hug, kiss?"

67% - "Definite vibe of force/dubious consent/etc. - especially when the things the 'forced to be naked woman' chooses to do on her own initiative, be a nude model for an art class, gets a one liner ('did modeling, got two more gigs from the guy'); while the force stuff, for the most part, gets a lot more than one liners.

And seriously? Just . . .breaking into a student's room and sitting on her bed? Dr. Slater is evil."

I've several problems with the book, some noted above. In addition to whatever can be pulled from there:
1) Every step of the way the main character was pushed into doing things out of her control and against her will, sure there were 'okay, you don't have to do it but if you don't you will be kicked out of school and . . . stuff';
2) Things were built in to make 'stuff' more creepy - like how the professor behind the experiment didn't want just anyone (which, apparently, includes real volunteers since they would be the kind of woman (or man) who 'wanted' to do that kind of thing (or have been willing) because . . . . um . . because she's a twisted freak? And the other professor who almost raped her; and the PR person who kept pushing and pushing her into situations the MC didn't want to be in; or the vaguely (and somewhat less so) creepy roommate who kept dragging her boyfriend around to see her 'naked roommate'; to . . . well, even the parents were creepy in their way and no I don't mean the part where they 'just didn't understand' or 'freaked out', I mean they way they went behind her back and purposefully or accidentally made their own daughter out as a liar and fraud (when they attempted to get the professor and school/dean in trouble - mind you they waited several months - until it everything was all over, before they did this stunt) by pointing out . . . well, the truth behind what occurred - that their daughter wasn't in fact making some grand point about nudity and body image and crap like that, but had, instead, been blackmailed into being naked - nationally); to the friends back home who force her to be naked around them - including the part wherein one friend almost got her arrested.
3) WTF is up with that ending? I've partially noted what occurred above but - super creepy professor who was forcing MC to do what she was doing, and at times 'broke into' the girl's room and sat on her bed and strongly encouraged her to do stuff (no, not sexual - continue being naked in public) - 'helped' the MC when she was almost raped and blackmailed that other professor to give the MC a good grade - and later telling the MC that 'he'd be dealt with after the semester is over'. That rapey-professor? Apparently was either forgotten by the time the semester ended, or had no problems associated with his actions - legal or otherwise. At least, nothing was mentioned at the end of the book. No, it was the dean, the creepy 'force blackmailed girl to be naked' professor, and the PR person who got into trouble - and . . . the MC stood up for the creepy professor (at least in the sense that her actions could be construed to help that professor stay on campus - she, in her way, hated the professor and her actions, but . . . um . . . film of her naked was already school property and . . . um . . . the MC . . . preferred the creepy professor to handle it? Something like that? Course, creepy-mccreep then turned around and sold the footage to a film company so . . . MC was stupid. Or something.

Death Goes Overboard by David S. Pederson

Death Goes Overboard
by David S. Pederson
Pages: ?
Date: April 1 2017
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Series: Detective Heath Barrington Mystery (2nd in series)

Review
Rating: 3.65 to 3.85
Read: March 3-4 2017

*I received this book from NetGalley, and Bold Strokes Books in return for a fair review.*

Like the prior book in this series, and as expected, this book here stars Detective Heath Barrington of the Milwaukee Police Department. Unlike the prior book in this series, some part of the police work in this book actually occurs in Milwaukee. Though, despite jurisdiction issues, some of it also occurs outside Milwaukee’s city borders – like on a boat on one of the Great Lakes (Lake Michigan).

There are several plot lines but two main ones of importance: 1) Everyone, including literally an aunt, let Heath know that being a single man of his age is super risky and leads to talk of a certain nature (like, say, ‘it’s obvious that he is gay’; there’s an additional ‘especially the way he is so neat and how he dresses’ but I’ll let that pass) – as in: being a gay man in post WWII America is difficult and certain things are needed to be done to cover that up which can lead to a bunch of lying, deception, and the like (to be fair – without some level of lying, a gay man will find themselves out of work (at least with the police, and possibly in a mental institution somewhere getting electric shocks to their balls); 2) police work occurs.

Heath continues to date Officer Alan Keyes, though is having two issues in regards to that – 1) both are men and it is 1947; 2) does he actually want a steady relationship with anyone? That plot-line is followed throughout the book. Of major importance in the book. Regarding that ‘gay issue’, I have two things that came to mind while reading this book – 1) Heath seemed a lot more naïve than I would have expected for a man of his ‘advanced’ age (his exact age might have been given at some point, though he is somewhere in his 30s, and some comments would lead one to suspect him to be in the latter half of his thirties; the concept of a beard, of marrying a woman and having fun with men – with or without the wives knowledge, was something Heath never realized could happen; also something he had never heard of was a lavender marriage – gay man, lesbian woman, marry as each other’s ‘cover’ – granted, the first time I saw reference to that type of arrangement was in Ann Bannon’s book of the 1950s/60s – and I doubt she came up with the idea completely on her own (Bannon had both types of marriages in her series) and yes, I know 1959 is not 1947, and Heath seemed so naïve regarding gay issues, that I doubt he read gay fiction, much less lesbian pulp); 2) he and another gay man in the book seem to fall into a particular gay stereotype I didn’t expect to see – both him and Riker (another police officer in the book, more on him later), seem to be rather ‘causal’ about sex – more so Riker (Heath is more tempted by the idea and keeps being inches from falling into that type of lifestyle) – as in, all the sex they can get, with men, as much as they can get, regardless of the man or the circumstances (it was so much of a gay stereotype that I actually began to believe that Riker was actually bait – either from some higher ups in the police force trying to trick/trap Heath; or someone Alan Keyes got to ‘check on’ Heath since Heath was acting a little ‘pulling-away-ish’). So that story line flows through the book as well – that ‘should Heath, while eyeballing every man around him as a sexual object, decide that Alan is really ‘his’? Should Heath get a ‘beard’, get himself into a marriage? *proceeds to eyeball every woman around him as a means to an end – marriage cover*.

The other major plot being followed is a different type of mystery (what, there’s a kind of mystery involved in ‘will Heath chose some woman to marry? Stay with Alan? Stray?’). Gregor Slavinsky is taking a great lake cruise – and he is being followed by a man named Ballentine and his lackey George. Slavinsky has been in and out of prison – and has just recently gotten out. And has secured $25,000 of Ballentine’s money as a loan. And Slavinsky is beginning to miss payments. Not something criminals like to hear.

The police have wanted to ‘get’ Ballentine for a while now and believe that this is a perfect opportunity to catch him doing something illegal. So Heath is sent undercover on the Great Lake voyage as an insurance man. A new-to-the-series officer also is undercover as a steward – that would be the previously mentioned Riker.

There is a mystery, and plot A does lead to b, c, d, and the police are shown to use their brains to follow along. With the introduction of certain elements, I immediately knew ‘something’ was occurring, though it took a body going over the side of the boat for me to ‘know’ what was going on. And, while it took the rest of the book for the characters to catch up, I was correct. Mind you, despite that last sentence, the cops weren’t made to look too inexperienced/naïve/stupid – they followed logically along, including a few wrong guesses (real life isn’t ‘Cop: x occurred, didn’t it? Criminal: how did you know!!!’). I did have a problem with one element, maybe minor, maybe not important, but . . . well. As can occur in mystery novels – there comes the time when the brilliant detective reveals the plot points, or I mean, how he figured it out. One slight issue I had here is that the author went one step too far. He had his detective ‘know’ and ‘reveal’ why that whiskey bottle was in the cabin. But, while there is a logical explanation, and while he can logically come to the conclusion that ‘this’ is the reason for the whiskey bottle, he can’t ‘know’ that this is the reason – for everyone who could confirm the matter is dead – died before he put the facts together. Hence my ‘one step too far’ – one step too far in trying to make the police detective look brilliant. Now, all that needs to happen is a few word changes. Something like ‘it is likely that’ instead of ‘it was there because’. Semantics. Logically the steps, pieces, were laid for that specific clue to be found – except for the part where it had to remain speculation (’I also thought the bottle of whiskey in Gregor’s cabin was strange, as he drank martinis. [X] was the one who liked whiskey, but of course [x] didn’t’ want to risk [y] finding [x]’s bottle and getting smashed, so [x] kept it in Gregor’s cabin and used the connecting door . . . .’ - lot of speculation going on in that ‘reveal everything’ being treated as fact .

The time on the ship was quite interesting, the mystery, despite several things I’ve stated, was also well enough crafted (a little heavy handed, but well enough crafted). The wandering eye is a character issue, not exactly one I wished to read, but feasible. As is those several talks about marriage (lavender or not). Overall a good book. I liked the first book more than the second, but second was good enough.

Rating: 3.65 to 3.85

March 6 2017

At Last by Lynn Galli

At Last by Lynn Galli

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Quick thoughts:
1) re: ‘Learn how the Virginia Clan came to be and watch as Willa and Quinn settle into their new life together.’ & re: ‘Virginia Clan Book 0’ – This is a book that covers something like 12 and a half years and not all of that time is shown, some is leapt over. And while a big chunk of time that is skipped is from the end of the book to the epilogue section, not all of that missing time occurs in that in-between section (no, that’s only 7 of the years). The book starts before the Virginia Clan series, proceeds through the years those books occur, and then ends afterwards.

a) That sentence I quoted above, the ‘Learn how the Virginia Clan came to be and watch as Willa and Quinn settle into their new life together’ is very misleading. You, the reader, do not actually ‘get to learn’ anything (that's putting it strongly, certain things are learned, like how Jessie and two others were friends of Quinn's, and Willa got pulled into their circle (though that's something tossed out years after the joining of Willa into the circle)). While the book starts before the clan got together, one of the ‘leap forwards’ occurs in such a way that the clan is already formed once the ‘leaping forward in time’ ends. I’m not actually sure who all is considered part of the Clan. Some have their own books, but some don’t. To a certain extent, one of the things I was looking forward to seeing, one of the interesting aspects of that could have been here, if the book had actually included a 'learning about the formation', would have been finding out why those two really rough and disagreeable people, who no one likes, joined the group – especially since they don’t a have a book of their own. I mean, most of these people are deliberately ‘misseen’ by the group. They probably are as well.
- Jessie the player who might not be
- Willa the robot, but isn’t
- M who can’t string two words together and is very quiet – unless you take one of her classes, or one of the two people she is closest to
- Etc. etc.
- Des the rough bitchy type who . . . what? Is really a rough bitchy type? Is actually a cuddly bear? Is actually even ‘worse’ than a rough bitchy type? We will never know.

b) While it is true that this book starts before the first book in the series, it is also try that it ends after the last, current, book in the series. And therefore certain information will be revealed that those who have not read this series and do not desire to be ‘spoiled’ should not read. Mostly in the epilogue section, but things dribble out here and there elsewhere in the book.

2) Sex both occurs and is graphically described. Feelings occurred and stuff.

To reiterate: while the description makes this book appear to be a prequel, it isn’t really. You don’t actually see the formation of the ‘Virginia Clan’, and you learn stuff that is ‘spoiler-y’ for some of the other books in the series. This is better read after the other books have been read.

Oh, and it is also an expanded version of ‘Finally’ in that ‘Finally’ short story collection. Though that’s stated up front in the book. And I’ve not read that Finally book so I can’t really comment on that aspect. Also – I’m glad now that I hadn’t read that book, because two of the stories have been expanded to full length books now (this book and Out of Order), so I’m happy to be able to experience them fresh.

Rating: 3.67

March 7 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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Don't Feed the Trolls by Erica Kudisch

Don't Feed the Trolls
by Erica Kudisch
Pages: 205
Date: April 3 2017
Publisher: Riptide Publishing
Series: None

Review
Rating: 3.88
Read: February 22 2017

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

Mini-review: Curious how the book has been marketed so far, I looked it up on NetGalley (Netgalley link and the publishers website (Riptide Link). The book has been put into two sections on NetGalley – General Fiction (Adult) and LGBTQIA – and Riptide has other works up that they’ve put in the Romance section so that was done on purpose. And the publisher has the genre listed as ‘drama, new adult’.

So there you go – this is a LGBTQIA new adult general fiction book filled with drama. But do not specifically look for romance.

Genre: Drama, New Adult, LGBTQIA, General Fiction
Setting: New York City, Seattle (GeeKon convention), Los Angeles, Eternal Reign game
Occupations: Actress, Singer, Writer, Gamer, Drag Queen
Main Characters: Fatiguee Altestis */Daphne Benoit **/Daphnis ***/Bannedict *** (* - Eternal Reign name used by the character; ** - birth name; *** the character, after controversy erupts, enters Eternal Reign on a new server on an alternative just-created account named Bannedict (and when asked by someone what their meat name is/was, they reply ‘Daphnis’, which is, apparently, the male form of Daphne)
Major Characters Alain/Ivy LeVine (drag queen roommate, Ivy being the drag queen name); Jackie/Lady Francois (rich fanfiction author (the Lady Francois part, though I’m not sure how often that name actually gets mentioned) with many devoted followers); Sachem/Orin (Sachem is Fatiguee Altestis’s second in command in the Eternal Reign game, and the meat people (or the players who control the characters), Orin and Daphne have a long history together); Uhruu*D*/Laura (current head of the server Bannedict/Daphnis plays on, potential romance interest).
Side Characters: Malcolm Harding (head of publicity at Summerstorm); Ivan (angry dude-bro); Martin Summers (head of Summerstorm, which puts out Eternal Reign – barely in book); Neal Merino (MMO correspondent for Jongleur/maintainer of Eternal Reign subreddit); Kilosi (character in Eternal Reign).
Story: The book opens with the main character receiving news that their submission in a novelization contest had won a contest (prizes include such things as a ‘badge’ for GeeKon convention). Certain amount of shocked screaming then occurs among the main character, whose name shifts depending on the situation, Alain and Jackie. Between excited squeaking and delivery of celebratory dinner, Daphne logs onto the internet – to be meet with waves and waves of vicious cyber-bullying attacks based entirely on the fact that Fatiguee’s won and assumptions that, since the game character is female, then the player is also female.

Naturally this deeply impacts Daphne who is already having a tough time of it – what with her real life attempts to make it as an actor haven’t gone that way lately. And stuff. So a certain distancing from Fatiguee occurs, but not from the game. No, the creation of a new game character, a male character, occurs – Bannedict. This almost immediately leads Daphne to tell someone through in-game chatting that their real life name is Daphnis.

The controversy swirls. Games played. White-knighting occurs by Orin. Gamergate-like backlash ensues. Gaming convention occurs. Gender questions are raised (as in, as the snippet on Netgalley puts it, ‘I might not be a woman, not really.’)

Review:
Thoughts: In general, this was an enjoyable book to read. In general. Certain rough patches occurred, hence the drama genre tag, certain realizations made through the fog of ‘do I just think it would be easier to be male, or do I actually think I might be?’

As far as the gaming aspects – most of the stuff that occurred flew right over my head – I mean the in-game descriptions. And I kind of had the impression that Laura and Daphnis would spend more time together in the course of the book (even if only through the game). They did, just . . . less time than expected. And good thing this isn’t really a romance because there was more ‘romance’ like stuff between Orin and Daphne than between Laura and Daphnis (thin relationship then pouncing).

I thought of certain things when I was thinking of what to put in a review. Like above how I mentioned that much of the in-game stuff flew over my head. And I was thinking how much or little of my own experience I should mention. Like, should I mention that I played MUDs, MUSH’s and the like back in the early and mid-1990s? Played multi-player games of Doom in college? Played one version of one of the Star Wars online multiple player games, played another version of Star Trek, twice attempted to play WoW and got bored quickly; and that I myself am basically a game character? No? Not mention? Mention? Normally it isn’t an important part of a review of a book, except here when I make comments like how the gaming stuff flew over my head. Probably because I’ve spent the most time involved in games that were/are different than that described in this book.

Right. Well, interesting good book.

Rating: 3.88

Read and Reviewed: February 23 2017

References made by me to other vaguely similar work/topics:
Internet/cyber bullying - Camp Rewind (woman tries to hide from internet/cyber bullying by going to an adult summer camp) & Drawn Together (I didn't finish the first, and haven't tried the second; my understanding of the second is that online stuff occurs, but most of the abuse is in person relating to a relationship).

Gaming/convention - Playing Passions Game, Love Games, Girl on Geek, The Student, the Rogue, the Catburglar

Genderfluid - transgender or not transgender? - Under My Skin (or, having people take you for more than one gender depending on 'things' (accounts, roles, etc.)