Literature

I Am N: Inspiring Stories of Christians Facing Islamic Extremists

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I received this book from David C. Cook and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I was excited and intrigued when I spotted this one on Netgalley and pleased to be approved to review it.

I liked the basic premise, it is a collection of stories about Christians living in areas where they are the minority and facing persecution because of it.  However, this book blurred together into a collection of vague and general stories of suffering after a few of the stories.

As a Christian living in Kurdistan (Iraq) I expected to feel a bit more inspired.  I know that I’m a foreigner living here as a guest and that my experiences are nothing like what I read, but I was disappointed in the lack of a holistic examination of what goes on in the region.  Beyond a few passing references to Muslims that offer help in some small way, there was no discussion of the wonderful people that make up the majority of the population.  For every fanatic, there are dozens of people who treat their Christian neighbors well and even assist them at their own risk.

Christians face dangers in this part of the world.  This is a fact.

To be labeled “n” in a community dominated by Muslim extremists is to undergo an immediate identity and life change.  With this mark comes the ultimatum: If you convert to Islam or pay the tax, you can keep your material possessions and remain in this community.  If not, leave or you will die.

Again, there is a brief mention of the fact that most Muslims aren’t radicals, but it feels like lip service.  I simply couldn’t love this book, it was too superficial.  Perhaps my own Catholic background was simply incompatible with this more emotionally charged brand of Christianity, or maybe this simply isn’t the book to help me on my walk.  Either way, I applaud the sentiment but have no passion for the content.

Two Stars.

Expected Publication: March 1, 2016

Nowhere Girl

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I received this ARC from Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.

Well if this wasn’t a haymaker, I don’t know what is.

Cady’s twin sister was murdered sixteen years ago.  She felt it happening and the despair and horror never left her.  Cady lives her life in the shadow of Savannah’s absence.

Trauma climbed along the corridors of my mind and wrapped itself around the present so I couldn’t really tell the two apart.

Now a famous author, the cold case is finally reopened and she thinks she’s getting somewhere.

Instead of letting that memory drown me, I’d write.  I’d write to stay alive.  I’d write to keep the pain out of reach.

Strecker is a true wordsmith.  I honestly wasn’t sure what I was reading most of the time.  From the beginning I thought I had it all figured out and I smugly read a chapter here and there for an entire month.  It wasn’t until a lazy Saturday that I resolved to get down to business and finish it and after a few chapters I couldn’t put it down.  I was wrong.

We can barely speak our sister’s name aloud, never mind talk about what happened to her.  And then to us.

As Cady essentially simply exists with the help of her best friend Gabby and a few close friends her strange twin connection with Savannah slowly brings things to light.  Cady tiptoes towards the truth but will she ever be able to accept it?

An excellent read.

Five stars.

Expected Publication Date: March 1, 2016

A Girl’s Guide To Moving on

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I received this ARC from Ballantine Books in exchange for an honest review.

This is chick lit.  I have never been known to read chick lit, but boy did I (guiltily) enjoy this!

Nichole has recently left her philandering husband, inspiring her mother-in-law-Leanne- to do the same.  It seems like father, like son held true in this case.  Moving into the same apartment building in downtown Portland, the two create a guide to help them start their new lives-a guide to moving on.  Nichole starts teaching and volunteering part-time and Leanne puts her Master’s degree to use at last and becomes a volunteer ESL teacher.  Both finally have purpose and as their broken hearts mend they endeavor to weather oncoming storms and even find love again in unlikely places.  These women are bent but not broken and have a dash of spunk thrown in for good measure.  I especially enjoyed Leanne as she came to terms with ending a 35 year marriage and being alone for the first time ever.

He told me I was no longer alone and I believed him.

This book is not particularly imaginative and it is not a tale you’ve never read before but it is feel-good, earnest and cute.  I enjoyed reading it and I’m sure my constant “awww” could be heard all over Kurdistan.  I would not turn down another Macomber galley.

How blessed I was to have found the courage to move on.

Three stars.

Expected Publication: February 23, 2016

Bad Luck (Bad #2)

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I received this ARC from Little, Brown Books for Young Readers in exchange for an honest review.

Something about this cover caught my eye and after reading the description I just had to read it.  Upon discovering it was the second in a series I quickly snagged the first book and read that in a couple of hours.  I liked this one slightly more!

Bad Luck is a fun, breezy read.  Clay is back, still at Earth Ranch with his motley crew of new friends (and his nemesis, Flint) just a couple of weeks after Bad Magic left off.

Disguised as an outdoor survival camp for juvenile delinquents, Earth Ranch was, secretly, a magic camp for young adepts-a camp that depended on its remote location and ever-present vog for protection.

As he learns more about magic and the secret world that operates in it, strange things continue to abound.  When a boy around his age-Brett-washes up on the shores of Price Island, things just get stranger and stranger.  Since this is a book for young readers and a few might stumble upon my humble blog, I won’t betray more of the plot.  Just know that the spunky youngsters embark on a fun adventure!

I would like to tell you about the brave exploits that followed.  How our heroic friends from Earth Ranch vanquished all their enemies…

I absolutely love the narrator of the series!  The completely hilarious way he/she occasionally makes it known that they are a character in the story without betraying an identity is great.

The only question we need to answer now is the perennial one.  The question every writer faces.  What happens next?

Good question.  What will happen next?  The resolution of this book is a frustrating cliffhanger of sorts and I look forward to the next installment.  Will the Earth Ranch kids and S.O.S. vanquish the more unsavory magicians?  Will Clay figure out why Max-Earnest disappeared?

The bad guys had not won.  But neither, it must be said, had the good guys.  Not yet.

Three stars.

Expected Publication: February 9, 2016

Hard To Forget (Alpha’s Heart #3)

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I received this Arc from St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.

This is the third and (I think) final installment in Bella Jewel’s Alpha’s Heart trilogy.  I’ve had the privilege of being asked to read and review each one so this review is bittersweet.

Delaney is a bodyguard.  That’s right, a female bodyguard.  She’s been taking crap for her career choice day in and day out but she’s finally crawled her way out of the muck and is assigned her first big client.  Jaxson is a millionaire hotel chain owner.  He’s a babe, he’s ripped and he’s in danger.  Delaney takes on this case-bullets and all- with everything she has but that might mean taking him on too and not just until the threat is over.

You’re mine, Delaney.  For as long as I can fucking have you, you’re mine.

This was my favorite book of the series.  Hard to Forget had the best character building and the strongest plot.  I found Delaney likable and was rooting for her from the beginning, to put it bluntly she was a more ‘human’ character than the heroines in Jewel’s previous two books.  Jaxson has the typical macho male flaws but he too is intriguing and raw in a way that makes him seem real.  I powered through this one in one night, a work night if that’s any indicator of what a fun read it was.

I’ll hang on, Mr. Shields, because I think you just may be way too hard to forget.

Four stars.

Publication date: December 15, 2015

Hellraisers (The Devil’s Engine #1)

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I received this book from Netgalley and Farror, Straus and Giroux (BYR) in exchange for an honest review.

After six weeks of radio silence (you can blame regular exams+finals week for my first graders for that) I have to say, this one was different.

Marlow Green is a kid on the tail end of his last chance.  He’s expelled from school almost as often as he changes his clothes.  The world is out to get him, everything is out of his control.

Charlie was right.  For someone who couldn’t jog ten paces without reaching for his inhaler, Marlow did a hell of a lot of running.  Not sprinting, not jogging, not running a marathon.  No, his kind of running was the other kind.  He never ran toward anything, he ran away from everything.”

Enter the action-a secret group of hellraisers, literally.  A society dedicated to fighting off demons and sending them back below.  There is a machine, actually there are two.  These mysterious engines offer ultimate power and united they will bring hell on earth.

It was human nature to avoid evil, a warning signal in the blood and right now that warning was blaring like a siren.

Marlow may not be much out in the world but as a hellraising Engineer he finds his place in it.  With Pan, Herc, the lawyers, an enigmatic boss and a motley crew of brethren Marlow takes on evil and all hell follows, literally (St. Patrick’s Church in New York is leveled).

Death was stalking him, hovering over his shoulder, just out of sight.  And death was the least of his worries, too.  Because where he was going the fires burned way hotter than this.

I found this book to be quite interesting.  While a bit slow at times, I kept on reading it in spurts as time permitted.  The last part (it was written in three) was the most fast-paced and interesting but the overall plot kept me coming back for more.  I look forward to what our ragged cast of heroes do in the next installment.  Fire and brimstone can’t win, right?

Four stars.

Publication Date: December 1, 2015

Hard To Break (Alpha’s Heart #2)

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I received this ARC from St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.

I only just recently read and reviewed the first book in this series so I was delighted when I was offered a chance to do the same with the newest installment.

Quinn is just one of the boys, a skilled mechanic that spent her childhood working on cars with her dad.  When her mother passes away, Quinn has to step up and keep her family garage going and keep an eye on her grieving father.  She enjoys her work, though her personal life isn’t much to write home about.  When finances get desperate, enter Tazen Watts, world-famous mechanic with his own TV show.  He makes quick work of dismantling her life, starting with her garage.  She hates him, or at least she tries to.  She annoys him, or at least she used to.

He is getting to me and…I can’t deny it.  I like it.  I like it a hell of a lot.  I shouldn’t, but I do and a huge part of me is tired of pretending I don’t.

Like the book before it I found this to be a pleasant enough weekend afternoon read.  It was uncomplicated and quick, just the way I like my lazy morning reads.  A definite must if you are a Bella Jewel fan.

Three stars.

Publication Date: October 13, 2015

The Lost Girl (Fear Street)

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I received this ARC from Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.

Fear Street, the series of my childhood.  How could I turn down the chance to read and review the latest installment?!  R.L. Stine continues to prove he’s still got “it” and it isn’t going anywhere. Now that I’m no longer eight years old I breezed through this in under two hours, telling myself just one more chapter the entire way.  I absolutely loved it.

Michael Frost is your average high school senior in the suburb known as Shadyside.

Everyone in Shadyside knew about the Fear Mansion, which was owned by the weird family the street was named after.

Even after all this time just the mere reference to the Fear’s gives me the willies.  Michael is living an uneventful life.  He’s got great parents, friends and is on his way to Duke University in the fall.  Enter a beautiful yet odd new girl in town and some strange happenings and you have just another day in Shadyside.

Will Michael and his friends be yet more names added to the long list of Feat Street victims?  Buy the book and find out.

Run, I told myself.  Turn around and run.

Five Stars.

Publication Date: September 29, 2015

The Field Trip

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I snagged this ARC from Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

This book was described as “An adventure mixed with a touch of fantasy.  Add a twist of love.” on the author’s website and I think this holds true.  The Field Trip was a breezy read, something I would recommend on a plane ride or commute to work.

Ross-our protagonist-is a Botany professor preparing for a research trip that will take him away from home for several weeks.  He’s a bit socially awkward (in an almost cliché manner, he is a 30-something professor after all) and very pleased at his change of luck with women when one of his attractive female students takes an interest in him.  She is not what she seems and Ross realizes that rather quickly.  Being a bumbling, socially awkward sort, far too much time is devoted to his inner turmoil about the relationship before he sets off on his trip.  Long story short, Ross meets a strange woman and has an almost inescapable desire to help her do…whatever she urgently needs to do, no explanations offered.  Ross the awkward professor becomes Ross the chivalrous hero.  Insert shady happenings in the scenic woods, a strange pet and a dash of…

her presence had a magnetic pull so powerful that releasing her was as incomprehensible at that moment as not breathing.

I enjoyed this story for what it was, though the plot is thin enough at times to fall right through it to the conclusion.  I’m not complaining, sometimes I enjoy a short, obvious read.  I will definitely read R.A. Andrade’s next release.

Three stars.