Reading Fanatic Reviews
Books to Add to Your TBR list... or Not!Hey, ya’ll! I’m VERY behind getting my reviews up on the website! I’ve increased the reading and reviewing, leaving less of my leisure time available to update this website. I’ll do weekly posts with links to my reviews at Amazon; you can also check out my Amazon and Goodreads profiles.
By the way, I’m now a top 50 Amazon.com reviewer (#12 currently) and the top 8 US reviewer of all time on Goodreads (and top 9 in the world)… and the #6 US reviewer and #8 in the world in the past year. Cool stuff!
I hope to make updates to this site soon!
Timeless Beginnings by Amber Daulton
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Goodle Play, Scribd, 24 Symbols, Thalia, Mondadori, Angus & Robertson, Indigo (Chapters), and Bol.de
Timeless Beginnings*
Awesome Historical Time-Travel Romance!
What a different and delightful book! I really enjoy time-travel romance, but because of the very popular Outlander series, most time-travel romance seems to be Scottish. I quite enjoy that sub-subgenre, but what a delight to find just such a very different time-travel story. This is actually historical in two different ways. The heroine came forward from 1725 when she was drawn into a blue vortex in a cave when she was fleeing on her wedding night. She ends up in 1963 Bolivia on a salt flat. The author did an excellent job in the very beginning contrasting the hero and the heroine. The heroine’s section was first, and it sounded like any good historical romance. She even called herself a ninnyhammer. Then, the story switched to the hero in 1963, and he is a CIA spy who is undercover at an oil company while trying to figure out what’s going on with the political situation in Bolivia. The change to his part of the story actually sounded a bit like a thriller, much more hard edged than the heroines perspective. I thought that she started to acclimate a little too quickly to the 1960s given the significant time difference. But this book was still just an absolute delight. The two had an instant attraction to each other, but he wanted to hold back and protect her. Just lovely from beginning to end.
You Can Build a Profitable Online Business and Love Every Minute of It by Ankur Agarwal
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, Scribd, 24 Symbols, Thalia, and Bol.de
You Can Build a Profitable Online Business and Love Every Minute of It*
Decent Overview, But Not Enough Detail
Everybody wants to get into online businesses these days. With so many people out there on the web, entrepreneurs and would-be entrepreneurs see a potential gold mine. This book seeks to show how to build a profitable online business, as the title states. The bones of the book are sound in terms of the skeleton structure needed for modern online marketing. He discusses research and development, product development, funnels, mailing lists, social media, and webinars. Unfortunately, he only gives a paragraph or two for some subheadings in these topics, not enough to really tell you anything about how to actually build a profitable online business. If you’re completely new to the topic, this could be a good overview, but there isn’t enough detail for you to actually go out and start an online business.
Right for Me by Cindy Dorminy
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, Thalia, Mondadori, Angus & Robertson, and Bol.de
Right for Me*
A Sweet—Literally—Little Romance
While this book definitely does have some twists and turns that aren’t necessarily typical in contemporary romance, in the end, the lovely and intriguing characters make it a sweet little modern romance. The hero and the heroine are both decent people, truly good folks, who sometimes get in over their heads even with the best of intentions. Tommy is a great hero, a compassionate sweetheart of a guy. I loved the family aspect of this. Having grown up in a family of five daughters, I tend to love stories that show what happens between grown-up siblings and adult parent-child relationships. This one had all that family action going on. There’s a surprising amount of humor, and there are places where I laughed out loud. But there are also times that tug at the heartstrings just a little bit. I love a romance that can do both, especially when there is such a delightful couple at the core. Oh, and all the baking was a lot of fun, too!
Soothsayer by Allison Sipe
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, Scribd, 24 Symbols, Mondadori, and Angus & Robertson
Soothsayer*
Good Idea, Execution Weak
I am of several minds of this book. I liked the Arthurian backdrop, though I don’t think it was explored to its full extent. The characterization seemed inconsistent, and I thought the heroine was a bit too naïve and trusting of the hero. Just because he’s hot and saved her life doesn’t mean he’s necessarily trustworthy. There were definite issues with grammar, punctuation, and usage. Commas were problematic, as they often are in self-pubbed work, but there are other places where the wrong punctuation was used as well, like errant periods and incorrect punctuation of dialogue. The dialogue tags were a little odd at times and didn’t seem to always go with what the action was, so it was a little jarring. I think the story definitely needed tightening and focusing at the hands of a good editor. That being said, the author did create an interesting world; the execution just didn’t quite live up to the ideas.
Come Halloween by Robbie Cox
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, 24 Symbols, and Smashwords
Come Halloween*
Come Halloween, Indeed
I have read a few books by Robbie Cox before, and I like the way that he is able to make characters seem so real, even paranormal ones. This book is relatively short, but the author is able to build anticipation, making the reader wonder what the heroine is going to do about the two men who take up so much of her mental space, her dead husband and a good friend who has helped keep her from despair while she has been in mourning. Surprisingly, it is not as simple a choice as it might seem. You can’t help but feel for poor Derek, the living man who has a ghost for competition. The author has created a world that feels much like our own but with a paranormal twist. The author did warn about strong language and sexual situations. I don’t mind the sexual situations, but I don’t think that the use of strong language was necessarily handled well. If profanity and crude language are going to be used, I think it should be done to illuminate character, not just to use “bad” words. After all, a writer’s medium is words, and there are so many more than the blue ones! That said, this is still a delightful and intriguing read, and it might be fun to re-read it around Halloween.
The Power of Isolation by Janine Vance
Available at Amazon only
NOT with Kindle Unlimited
The Power of Isolation*
The Power of You
This collection of 26 essays–some long, some short–was originally put together by the author for herself to come back to when she needed to refresh and renew. I think the title, The Power of Isolation, isn’t wholly accurate. Isolation suggest that we need to be shut off from everything and everyone to tap into whatever power she is talking about. But that is not the case. All the essays do have to do with the self, so maybe a better title would be The Power of Self. Sometimes self is explored in relation to others, and other times, the exploration is completely within. The author is definitely into meditation, and some of the practices that aren’t up straight meditation involve it to some degree–if you see meditation as bringing mindfulness and a certain presence to your reality. If you’re into metaphysics at all, this is an interesting read that will get you thinking and sometimes doing!
Wild Type by M. Telsch-Williams
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Wild Type*
A Strange Blend of Elements
I am not quite sure what to make of this book. It’s kind of fantasy meets Indiana Jones. But the protagonist is an intelligent female in a society that does not value smart women. She is the daughter of the former top researcher in her land. The book was odd in that it seemed like it had some modern things, like microscopes, while other parts of it seemed somewhat primitive. The bulk of the book details a trip that she takes to the Farlands, a place her father always wanted to go but never did before he died. She discovers things about the Farlands… and her father’s past. She is in a power struggle with the leader of her area, who rules with an iron fist. Can wild type just define what she finds in the Farlands, or does it come to define her in her quest to be more than her society wants her to be?
Illegitimately Yours, Michael and Me by Catherine Taylor
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Illegitimately Yours, Michael and Me*
Targeted Topic Memoir with Fantastic Immediacy
I have never read the author’s fictional works because I don’t read erotica. But I was completely transfixed by this nonfiction book that she has written about her life and her family. Right from the first chapter, she is able to create a picture in words that pulls you right into her life. We relive an important Christmas with her when she was a young child. (In fact, I wonder how she can remember her very young life in such vivid detail.) I’ve rarely seen such a well-written, targeted-topic memoir that details someone’s life with such immediacy. Often in these kinds of books, it feels like we are being told what happened through the lens of someone looking back and adding their own, older-and-wiser judgment. Instead, this author lets us discover along with her as she did at the time. Brilliantly done.
Till the End of Time by Emma Berkeley
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, 24 Symbols, Thalia, Mondadori, Angus & Robertson, Indigo (Chapters), andBol.de
Till the End of Time, Mr. Darcy*
Poorly Written, Not Much Characterization
I greatly enjoy Jane Austen fanfiction, so I am always on the lookout for a new story or a new author. This book looks like it might be a slight twist on a familiar trope, the compromise. Unfortunately, the author doesn’t really seem to have a sense of how to write a book. The novella is very short, which can be fine, of course. But in this case, what the author did to achieve such a short text was to just about completely “tell” us the story, not showing much of anything at all. I don’t think there was any dialogue until the 13% or 14% mark. Instead we are told backstory and emotion through Elizabeth’s thoughts. Because the story was told so much, I never got a sense of the characters as people. There wasn’t as much to the plot as I hoped there would be. All in all, a very disappointing piece of Jane Austen fanfiction.
Queen of Martyr by Samantha Wilcoxson
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Queen of Martyrs*
Ponderous Start, Odd Time Leaps
I enjoy books that take a fictionalized look at historical characters, so I thought I would enjoy this book. I didn’t know much about the main character beforehand. The author jumped forward a lot in time. Each chapter was months or years distant from the previous and the next. So it felt like the book was just these small vignettes that weren’t really related, so they were hard to pull together. It didn’t feel like a cohesive story. The beginning felt tedious, with all her physical complaints and not liking being at court. I did like the glimpse it gave into the young Elizabeth who became Elizabeth I as well as her aging father, Henry VIII. But the book just felt too disjointed for me to really get into the story and follow the narrative flow.
Jamie Brydone-Jack
Reader, Editor, Writer
I’m an avid reader, for both fun and work/business. I enjoy a wide variety of books, including literary fiction, romance, thrillers, cozy mysteries, and fantasy for fiction and history, contemporary issues, philosophy, music, medicine, and cookbooks for nonfiction. I’m a freelance copyeditor who also does beta and alpha reading. I have two websites that are all about romance and mystery. You can also follow my reviews at Amazon, Goodreads, and Bookbub.
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