Reading Fanatic Reviews
All Kindle Unlimited ReviewsNOTE: These books were in Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited program at the time that I posted the reviews. They may not still be in the program, as authors can opt out every 3 months. If you find a book that is no longer in the program, don’t hesitate to contact me, and I will update the review.
Bell to Pay by Jeremy Waldron
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Bell to Pay*
Mildly Confusing and High “Ick” Factor
This book centers on investigative reporter Samantha (the Bell of the title) and a computer hacker who has turned murderous, Loxley. The story alternates between their viewpoints, hers in the first person and his in the third person. The first chapter is supposed to draw the reader into the villain’s story, but I found it too bogged down in extraneous detail that slowed down the pace of what could have been an exciting scene. I actually think that Chapter One should have been called a prologue, or at least the author should have stated at the top of the chapters who the viewpoint character is. Written like this, it is a little confusing as you jump from character to character, especially at the beginning before you catch on to the idea that viewpoint character switches when you see the change in person (first vs. third). When writing a book in this fashion–especially a thriller–it is good to know this info without having to overthink it so you can just keep reading without going “What?”, “Huh?”, or “Who?”.
This story had a high level of “ick” factor for me. I don’t really want to know about a killer’s sexual arousal during a crime or at any other time while thinking of his deeds or the protagonist. This certainly happened more often than I felt comfortable with. The book actually had a fairly decent amount of action like you hope for in a thriller, but I thought at times the prose was weighed down with too much detail about superfluous actions or inconsequential objects. Also, I am an RN, and I was appalled that the author had a nurse show Samantha a patient’s medical record–a HIPAA violation that could lose the nurse her job, money, and her license. In all, this book didn’t work for me, and I won’t be reading any more of the series.
Narcissistic Mother by Mia Warren
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Narcissistic Mother*
Style Improvements Needed, But Good Info
I recently read this author’s other book on changing your life after narcissistic abuse and was curious to see what her take was on parental narcissism; the other book was more about narcissism within a romantic relationship. The author herself states at the beginning of the book that she herself has a narcissistic mother, and I believe that her background has colored the rest of the book in both positive and negative ways.
The book is structured cleanly, with background definitions and explanations at the start, the effects of narcism, and a section ending on what you can do to heal from parental narcissistic abuse. The author seems to have pulled a lot of her information that isn’t clearly personal from the works of writers in the psychology field. In fact, some lists that I mention later below seem to be directly taken from other authors.
Within the chapters themselves, I think the author should have formatted each section to make it easier to read. Much of the background and explanations are written like a list–like a list of traits of a narcissistic mother or the forms of abuse that the narcissist will use. These are written just as sequential paragraphs that start in a very similar and boring fashion, like “the second sign of _____ is… [new paragraph] The third sign of _____ is…” Some of these lists go on for 10 or more signs, examples, or trades, so this can get tedious. It would have been more readable if the author had listed each sign as a subheading of the section within the chapter.
That said, if you believe you have a narcissistic mother (or father), this book will help you get clarity on precisely what that is, what it has done to you, and what you can do to heal now that you recognize that it is an issue.
King by Daya Daniels
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
King*
Not What I Hoped It Would Be
I despise book blurbs that give you no idea what the book is about. The blurb of this book has to be one of the most generic that I’ve read. Yet, I do enjoy historical fiction, so I thought I would give it a try. I find myself disappointed on two counts. I find that the writing style is more like that of a contemporary romance than of historical fiction, with lots of short-phrase paragraphs and sentence fragments. While historical fiction doesn’t need to sound like Shakespeare, I do think it needs to be elevated beyond fragments and have fully formed paragraphs.
The other main issue I have with the book is that while the author did state at the bottom of the book blurb that it does have “strong sexual content,” she wasn’t explicit. As the book involves violent spanking and other forms of power and control during sex, she should have used terms that readers know–like “power exchange” or “marital discipline”–to tip off those who don’t want to read that kind of book. While I don’t mind “strong sexual scenes” or general erotica (which is how this book was categorized at the book review site where I downloaded it)–whether they’re told explicitly or in more vague terms–I do not like books with any form of sadism. If I had known that was a part of this book, I never would have chosen it. If authors are proud that their books have BDSM, name it and claim it in the description; if they wish to hide the gory details, they should use the euphemisms as I described above. Authors should not expect readers to infer anything that isn’t explicitly stated (and I don’t equate erotica with BDSM; erotica may contain elements of it or may not), or they leave themselves open to bad reviews by readers who do not appreciate that kind of writing.
The Time Traveler’s Magic by Anna Applegate
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The Time Traveler's Magic*
Glaring Medical Errors Distracting
While it isn’t relevant to the entire book, I am an RN, and I have to say that I thought the hospital portions of the book were way off, starting with the phone call that Ember received about her mother lapsing into a coma. As an RN, I have had to make those phone calls myself to family members, and I would have never have called a patient’s daughter at work in that circumstance or asked her to come in right away (when there is nothing she can or needs to do). The idea of having a hospital administrator latching onto a family member when she enters the hospital asking for bill payment wouldn’t happen either. There would be no team of doctors entering her mother’s room, trying to figure out what happened with her mother; there would be one hospitalist or intensivist working with her for the day, and perhaps a consultant or two, but they would rarely all be in the room at the same time unless a critical, emergent event is taking place (and even then it wouldn’t be likely). I could go on, but I won’t.
Aside from the above, I felt like the book was an odd mishmash of what are a lot of contemporary characters/themes in independently published books: magic, vampires, shifters, pirates, and time travel. If only one of them were a billionaire, then most of the common tropes in fiction would have been represented! I didn’t think these all necessarily played well together. I also did not like the heroine; she seemed too inept to handle either the present or the past, which made the reading a bit tiresome.
Lowcountry Incantations by C. J. Geisel
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Lowcountry Incantations*
Not My Type of Southern Gothic
This is a nouveau Southern Gothic story for sure. You just know that things aren’t as they seem, and things certainly do go bump in the night. I didn’t particularly enjoy this book despite the author’s wonderful ability to put you right into a scene with her deft sensory descriptions. I was turned off by the very first chapter. I really think authors need to put warnings in the blurb when a book tackles, or even mentions, certain taboo subjects like incest. While I have no experience of that personally, thank goodness, I actually have no desire to read a book where it is at all a factor. The book is a page-turner and otherwise well written, so if the incest doesn’t bother you, you might enjoy this book.
Mindfulness by Olivia Telford
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Free with Kindle Unlimited
Mindfulness*
Practical, Helpful Mindfulness Exercises
Mindfulness definitely seems to be a buzzword these days. This book attempts to define it and help you use it to help your life, both dealing with the negatives and cultivating the positives. The book is relatively simple and straightforward beginning with the definition of mindfulness, some simple exercises, and meditation information and techniques. The first section after that goes into detail about destructive negatives, like stress, anger, and anxiety, that mindfulness could potentially help with. The next section looks at how mindfulness can be used to help build better habits (or beat bad ones), relationships, and perhaps a better life. Both of these practical sections have a little article about the topic and include mindfulness exercises that the author believes will help. One tiny little thing bugged me. The author clearly states at the beginning that mindfulness is not meditation, yet she includes meditation in the subtitle, perhaps making the potential reader think that meditation is the only way that mindfulness can be achieved or that this book is only about mindfulness through meditation. As noted above, meditation does have its own chapter, but the exercises in the rest of the book don’t focus on meditation.
I think this is a solid introduction to mindfulness that contains simple, practical exercises could be helpful if you have issues like I mentioned above.
What Million-Dollar Brands Know by Lisa N. Alexander
Available at Amazon (eBook, paperback), Barnes & Noble (paperback), Thalia (paperback)
Free with Kindle Unlimited
What Million Dollar Businesses Know*
Mostly Meant for Medium- to Large-Size Businesses
Perhaps because I work with so many entrepreneurs in my own entrepreneurial business, I tend to think about creating personal, solopreneur brands. This book does have some information that will help very small or one-person businesses with their branding and marketing, but the bulk of the book is truly about marketing for medium- to large-sized businesses. There definitely are nuggets here for a business of any size, and certainly, small business owners will find ideas that they can use as they scale their business to include more people. I think the author depends too much upon the words of other people, making the book seem like it is not her own insights or conclusions but rather a compilation of others’ business and marketing ideas. At times, this makes the book not as readable as it could be; there are lots of quotes–some of the long–that aren’t really pulled together by a topic sentence or framed for easier digestion. I think ideas could have been summarized better. Some content seems like generic marketing ideas that you could find anywhere. I do like the million-dollar questions at the end of each chapter; they are meant to get you thinking and working with the ideas of the book.
Rise of the Shieldmaiden by Jaime Loughran
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Rise of the Shieldmaiden*
Vikings and a Strong Heroine… What’s Not to Like?
If you like stories with Vikings and the strong women (I’ll admit to loving the evocative term “shieldmaiden”), this book will be right up your alley. Thora, the heroine, is a young woman who has lost much but is determined to avenge her family. This book is full of intrigue, crosses and double crosses, unlikely alliances, and a bit of romance. Much is going on in this book. Just some of the themes touched on include second chances, courage, redemption, power, patriarchy, and survival. Thora is tough; she is strong both physically and mentally even though certain men in her world don’t want her to be either and take unfair advantage of her because they can. I enjoy the action sequences and the evolving relationship between Thora and her unlikely hero. The book ends on a happy-for-now cliffhanger that tantalizes about what might be in the next book. I’m curious to see what that is.
Life Hacking Spiritual Practices by Joe Fontenot
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Free with Kindle Unlimited
Life Hacking Spiritual Practices*
Subtitle Better Fit Than Title
I think that the subtitle actually makes a better title than the real title of this book! When an author uses a trendy term like “life hacking,” I feel it more obscures what a book is about than illuminate. Something just rubs me wrong, too, about the idea of “hacking” anything spiritual. But I won’t keep going on about semantics. This book is meant for Christians who feel like the crazy modern world keeps them from truly living their Christian beliefs and hampers their closeness to God. The author has a clear and easy writing style as well as very workable suggestions and tips for how to become more focused on the religious aspect of your life and God. I wish, too, that the author had been more explicit in the blurb that this is a Christian book. The term “spiritual” can be used to define and describe a much broader realm than Christianity, so it is not accurate to use a more general term. Name it and claim it! This way, it makes it clear to people who just look at the blurb, and not the categories, what exactly this book is about. That said, this is a scripturally sound book written in in an engaging way that may help Christians find their way back to God, even with the pressures of modern life, and to help them live their lives in a way that more embodies Christ’s message.
Change Your Life after Narcissistic Abuse by Mia Warren
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Change Your Life after Narcissistic Abuse*
More about Background Info Than Changing Your Life
The title of this book makes you think it is going to be all about how to change your life after you get out of a relationship with someone who is clinically narcissistic. That is not wholly true; only the end portion of the book directly addresses this. (Even that section really isn’t about changing your life; it is more about issues you might have as you move on.) Earlier sections actually have useful information, but they aren’t about what the title says the book is. The book starts off defining clinical narcissism and some of its different types. The author then goes on to say how a person in a relationship with a narcissist can unwittingly feed the other person’s disorder and follows this with information about the typical tricks the narcissist uses to get his or her way. The author has quite a long section about how to not be a victim if you are in a relationship with a narcissist, finally suggesting that the best thing a person can do is leave the narcissist. Then, she guides the reader through the difficulties of trying to get away, including tactics that the narcissist will use to try to get the person back. Finally, the last section addresses what the title says the book is about (mostly). I think this book either needed to be more on point or have a different title.
This book reminded me about another one that was just released not long ago that looked at narcissism, Narcissist by Keith Coleman; the books are actually structured very similarly. This one has more information about what to do when you get out of the toxic relationship. There is one thing that annoyed me in this book; this has happened with several nonfiction books lately. In the middle of the book, there is a request for a review. I don’t mind one of these at the end of the book (and there is one there as well), but it is quite annoying to turn a Kindle page and see this; this even includes a graphic. Very irritating.
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