Book Reviews – Page 68 – Everything Is Better With Dragons

Review: ‘Resort To Murder’, By TP Fielden

Published By: HQ

Publication Date: 2nd November 2017

I.S.B.N.: 9780008193737

Format: Hardback

Price: £14.99

Blurb

Death stalks the beaches of Devon

With its pale, aquamarine waters and golden sands, the shoreline at Temple Regis was a sight to behold. But when an unidentifiable body is found there one morning, the most beautiful beach in Devon is turned into a crime scene.

For Miss Dimont ferocious defender of free speech, champion of the truth and ace newspaperwoman for The Riviera Express this is a case of paramount interest, and the perfect introduction for her young new recruit Valentine Waterford. Even if their meddling is to the immense irritation of local copper Inspector Topham

Soon Miss Dimont and Valentine are deep in investigation why can nobody identify the body, and why does Topham suspect murder? And when a second death occurs, can the two possibly be connected?

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Review: ‘The Flawed Ones’, by Jay Chirino

Published By: CreateSpace Independent Publishing

Publication Date: 30th October 2017

I.S.B.N.: 9780692928332

Format: Kindle and Paperback

http://theflawedones.com/

Blurb

In this compelling novel, Jay Chirino channels his own struggles with depression and addiction, creating a universal story that is painfully relatable for those with similar issues, and eye-opening for the ones that

haven’t dealt with the challenges of mental illness.

After leaving behind a trail of drug-addled destruction, Jay finds himself confined to the walls of a psychiatric hospital. He is now compelled to confront his actions, his issues, and the past that led him to such downhill spiral. But what surprisingly affects him most are the people that he becomes surrounded by; people with considerable deficiencies that will shed some light on the things that truly matter in life.

“The Flawed Ones” is a thorough examination of the struggles of mental illness, depression, addiction, and the effects they have on the human condition. Most importantly, it proves that physical and mental shortcomings do not necessarily define who we truly are inside- that the heart is, in fact, untouched by our “flaws”, and that love will always prevail above all.

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Vandals on the trains

On Sunday night someone damaged the signals between Doncaster and Meadowhall, meaning that stretch of line was out of use all day. It was being treat as a major crime scene. The staff working for Northern and TransPennine Express on trains and at the stations did their best but there was a lot of confusion, especially at Doncaster in the morning.

I don’t much care about train companies losing money because they make enough profit and don’t put much back into the train network, but I do care about the people, me included, who were inconvenienced and distressed by it all. As you know, one of the traits of my Aspergers is that I get seriously distressed by changes to plans. It right put me out and took at least an hour of mini golf to put me back in a fun mood. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one; people were desperate to get to work, or home, catch other trains or flights, or spend a day with their kids or friends doing something fun.

Punishment for a bit of property damage, where no one is harmed (harm being loss of a home, a means to earn a living, life etc.) seems a bit over the top to me, even though yesterday I wanted to kill the vandals, but at what point does it become a case of that property damage has caused more harm to individuals and/or a community, the commons, and serious punishment is just?

If a train company decides it’s cutting too much into their profits to put on replacement coaches or do the repairs so ‘sorry, we’re not running a service on that line anymore’ and leaves people dependant on the trains stranded; if someone misses an important medical appointment and suffers for longer because of the delays; a person loses their job because they got to work late or couldn’t get to work at all? How much harm has to be caused to the community, not the profits of rail companies and their shareholders, by vandalism, and how should it be punished?

I spend far to much time thinking about this stuff.

November book reviews

Happy Halloween peeps; I spent yesterday in Sheffield playing mini golf dressed as the new breed of vampires from Blade 3. My costume was composed of an over-large hoody and a pair of jeans.

But on to the reviews for November.

1st November
- Jay Chirino – The Flawed One
2nd November
- TP Fielden – Resort to Murder
7th November
- Theresa Cheung & Claire Broad – Answers From Heaven: Incredible True Stories of Heavenly Encounters and the Afterlife
- Clink Street Blog Tour
10th November
- Matthew Ludden – Caitlin Kelman
18th November
- Joe Eckhardt – Living Large: Wilna Hervey and Nan Mason
23rd November
- Annabel Fielding – A pearl for my mistress
24th November
- Nicola Findlay – Live Like you give a f**k
25th November
- Daniel M. Jones & Theresa Cheung – Become the Force: 9 Lessons on How to Live as a Jediist Master
29th November
- Jeanne Skartsiaris – Dance Like You Mean It

I’m probably going to be a bit busy this month. I’m trying to get Fire Betrayed ready for publication too.

Review: ‘Zombie! Haunted Mansion: Memoir of Jesse Jamieson’, by Zombie Origin Media

I received this e-book from the authors after they saw my listing on http://www.indiereview.com.

Published By: Independently Published

Publication Date: 29th May 2017

I.S.B.N.: 9781520352121

Format: E-book, also available as Paperback

Price: £2.33 (Paperback: £7.80)

Blurb

Stranded in the middle of nowhere, an unlikely group of high school friends embark on a series of adventures and mishaps to survive a remote zombie outbreak. With bloodthirsty ghouls trailing close behind, Jesse and his friends stumble upon an eerie mansion offering refuge from the zombie infested woods. But the residents of Krakuz Manor may be hiding a sinister secret more dangerous than the undead threat outside, or they might just be complete lunatics. Either way, Jesse and his friends must prepare for the impending zombie horde if they hope to survive their trip to hell. With no communication to the outside world for help, can a mismatched group of teenagers defend Krakus Manor against the undead, or will they fall victim to a living dead nightmare

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Review: ‘Lady First’, by Lea O’Harra

Independently Published

Publication Date: 28th August 2017

I.S.B.N.: 9781549610981

Format: Kindle e-book and paperback

Price: Kindle – £2.00, Paperback – £7.99

Blurb

Murder is back, and it’s nastier than ever… Fujikawa in southern Japan is finally getting over the shock murder of a resident university head and, three years later, the strangling of a local child – when terror strikes the quiet, provincial town once more. When young Mayumi Ikeuchi is killed on her way home from her job at The Paradise nightclub in a Fujikawa park, there isn’t a shortage of suspects. These include Mr Tani – Mayumi’s boss – who likes to leer over the girls who work for him, and Atsushi Taniguchi, a man who seems quite normal to the outside world but is free with his fists around his wife, Yui. There is also Nose-san, a loner who lives with his aged, incontinent mother, with witnesses hearing the sounds of brutal, physical arguments coming from his house. Even Mayumi’s sister is reported to have been overly possessive of the girl, threatening her when Mayumi had declared she wanted to strike out on her own. Lise Foster and Yui Taniguchi forge an unlikely friendship after the death of Mayumi: one is a victim of violence and the other may become one. Lise is a teacher at the local school, living close to the murder site in Ogawa Woods, and is it her imagination or is there someone sinister lurking outside her home in the shadows? Could Lise be next? For Chief Inspector Inoue and Inspector Kubo – Yui’s brother – and their colleagues, it is a race against time to find the perpetrator before he strikes again.

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Review: ‘Sweet Pea’, by C. J. Skuse

Published By: HQ

Publication Date: 2nd November 2017

I.S.B.N.: 9780008216719

Price: £7.99

Format: Paperback

Blurb

The last person who called me ‘Sweetpea’ ended up dead…

I haven’t killed anyone for three years and I thought that when it happened again I’d feel bad. Like an alcoholic taking a sip of whisky. But no. Nothing. I had a blissful night’s sleep. Didn’t wake up at all. And for once, no bad dream either. This morning I feel balanced. Almost sane, for once.

Rhiannon is your average girl next door, settled with her boyfriend and little dog…but she’s got a killer secret.

Although her childhood was haunted by a famous crime, Rhiannon’s life is normal now that her celebrity has dwindled. By day her job as an editorial assistant is demeaning and unsatisfying. By evening she dutifully listens to her friend’s plans for marriage and babies whilst secretly making a list.

A kill list.

From the man on the Lidl checkout who always mishandles her apples, to the driver who cuts her off on her way to work, to the people who have got it coming, Rhiannon’s ready to get her revenge.

Because the girl everyone overlooks might be able to get away with murder…

Continue reading “Review: ‘Sweet Pea’, by C. J. Skuse”

Changes to this month’s reviews

I had booked in John A. Heldt‘s Mercer Street in for Friday and M.N.Mekaelian‘s Choose to Rise: The Victory Within next week, but Mercer Street doesn’t really fit into my interests at the minute. I don’t want to read a book and give it a bad review because I’m not in the mood, so I’ve shelved it. I was expecting to receive Choose to Rise: The Victory Within in early September but it hasn’t arrived yet. I’ve been in touch with the author and he’s going to resend, probably as an ebook this time. When the book arrives I will schedule it, probably for next year now.

Instead of those two books, on Saturday I’ll be reviewing C J Skuse‘s new book, Sweet Pea, which will be published by HQ on the 2nd November, and next week, on the 26th, I’ll be reviewing Lady First by Lea O’Harra (the pen name of Wendy Jones Nakanishi). It’s the third book in the ‘Inspector Inoue Mystery Series’. I’ve started it already, because I’ve nearly finished Sweet Pea.

Review: ‘The Watcher’, By Monika Jephcott

Publisher: Clink Street Publishing

Publication Date: (10 Oct. 2017)

Format: Paperback

Price: £8.99

ISBN-13: 978-1912262021

Blurb

It’s 1949 when Netta’s father Max is released from a Siberian POW camp and returns to his home in occupied Germany. But he is not the man the little girl is expecting – the brave, handsome doctor her mother Erika told her stories of. Erika too struggles to reconcile this withdrawn, volatile figure with the husband she knew and loved before, and, as she strives to break through the wall Max has built around himself, Netta is both frightened and jealous of this interloper in the previously cosy household she shared with her mother and doting grandparents. Now, if family life isn’t tough enough, it is about to get even tougher, when a murder sparks a police investigation, which begins to unearth dark secrets they all hoped had been forgotten.

Amazon UK – http://amzn.to/2jpKeBs

About the author: Monika Jephcott Thomas grew up in Dortmund Mengede, north-west Germany. She moved to the UK in 1966, enjoying a thirty year career in education before retraining as a therapist. Along with her partner Jeff she established the Academy of Play & Child Psychotherapy in order to support the twenty per cent of children who have emotional, behavioural, social and mental health problems by using play and the creative Arts. A founder member of Play Therapy UK, Jephcott Thomas was elected President of Play Therapy International in 2002. In 2016 her first book Fifteen Words was published.

Website – http://monika-jephcott-thomas.com/

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Review: ‘Drip’, by Andrew Montlack

Published By: Rent-Controlled Films

Publication Date: April 2017

I.S.B.N.: 9781541102125

Price: £10.36

Format: Paperback

Blurb

“A hand wearing a fancy watch parted the office blinds, and J.D. felt nauseous with despair: suddenly he knew—even though he could not explain how—that all of his mojo had been permanently taken away.”

J.D. and George: thick as thieves since the fourth grade. J.D., the troublemaker, the stud: the alpha. George, the sidekick, the misfit: the loser. Upon graduating college, J.D. has convinced the only job creator in rusty Middlestop to hire them. BrewCorp, the hot new coffee and retail chain, is offering a vice presidency to the employee with the boldest plan for growth, and J.D. is determined to be the guy. When not sleeping with co-workers, he hatches his pitch for a one-of-a kind data pipeline. He is unbeatable–until George grabs the promotion. Now J.D. wants answers. His quest to find them—and to deal with the monstrous truth—is the subject of indie filmmaker Andrew Montlack’s wry debut novel, which features the same biting satire that made his mockumentary, The Devil’s Filmmaker, a cult classic.

My Review

Took me a bit to get into, and at first I couldn’t understand the ‘gothic’ part of the title, but then, of course I got the reason.

It’s an unusual vampire tale, set in the corporate world, of two friends. George is hopeless, JD is charismatic. Where George trips and falls through life, JD dances and laughs and gets his own way. Friends from a young age, the pair finally graduate from university and get jobs at BrewCorp, the latest business to set up in their small, dying town.

When George wangles the job of junior executive, JD is jealous – HE was going to get that position. George starts to change, and much to his chagrin, JD loses his mojo. Secrets about BrewCorp and its real purpose start to leak though, as the project that got them their positions comes to fruition.

I liked this story, eventually. It took a bit of getting into and JD, the main character, was a bit of a prick. The writing felt pompous but as with JD’s character, that gets better as the novel goes on and I certainly enjoyed the second half as the ‘gothic’ part in the novel became clearer.

Could have done with a bit of editing for spelling towards the last few chapters, even allowing for dodgy US spelling conventions. Story instead of storey is just about acceptable, souls when the word is clearly meant to be soles is not.

3/5