Reading Fanatic Reviews
Romantic FantasyThe 6-Figure Ghostwriter by Matthew Thrush
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
The 6-Figure Ghostwriter*
One Long Advertisement
When I saw this book pop up at my favorite book reviews site, the blurb sounded too good to be true, but it caught my attention because I have toyed around with the idea of ghostwriting for some time. I have done a variety of writing both on the job and for the companies I have worked for, and I do enjoy writing. I was hoping this book might be the answer to my questions about how to exactly break into this business. Unfortunately, the book is more of an extended advertisement for the writer’s mentorship and course business that purports to teach you all that you need to know to become a six-figure ghostwriter. The first part of the book is his description of the early days of his ghostwriting business, which doesn’t actually sound too good as he had to put out an obscene amount of words to make his financial goals. Following this most extended description of his early ghostwriting career is a section of testimonials from people who have taken part in his courses or mentoring. The chapters following give a little bit of information, but even this is mixed with healthy doses of more of the author’s backstory and philosophy. There is little that is actionable here, aside from signing up with Upwork for ghostwriting jobs and signing up for the author’s courses. Really, this is just one gigantic advertisement for his “ghostwriting business” business, where he will supposedly help you on your path to your ghostwriting career. I know that lead magnets are often published on Amazon and other outlets, but usually they actually have something to offer the reader beyond the advertisement. Unfortunately, this book does not.
By the way, out of curiosity, I followed some of the links to his courses. The one he gives you a coupon (so you can get it for free) at the end of the book is a dead, 404 link. One of the links to one of his more expensive programs is live, but even the link about his other courses goes to a 404 page. Buyer certainly beware.
A Wicked Earl’s Widow by Aubrey Wynne
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Scribd, 24 Symbols, Thalia, Mondadori, Angus & Robertson, Indigo (Chapters), and Bol.de
A Wicked Earl's Widow*
Well Written, But Heroine Lacks On Occasion
Eliza, the heroine, finds herself at the mercy of her father yet again when she thought she was beyond his grip. He is an abusive man who has harmed both her and her mother over the years, and he wed her to a known rake (the Wicked Earl of the title) as a means to his own end, not caring about her happiness one wit. Though it took time, she and the earl eventually did come to have a genuine love match before he was killed in a riding accident when she was pregnant with their first child. Eliza’s father now wants to use her to marry again for his benefit, and he even threatens his granddaughter to try to force Eliza to comply. Her loving in-laws develop another plan, and on her way to hide out from her father, Eliza meets Nate when she attempts to stop hooligans from attacking an old woman.
I absolutely adored the hero, Nate. He is charming to watch as he becomes at first fascinated and then infatuated with the heroine; she affects him like no other woman, and the author actually did an excellent job of showing this. Right from the start, he could see that there was something more to her, a deeper and darker past that made her who she was and gave her the complexity that drew him in. I thought the author did a good job showing the effects of abuse in Eliza in a believable way. Eliza is at turns docile and obliging while at other times is filled with a rage that doesn’t seem to be within her character unless you know her background. I thought the scene with her whipping the hooligan showed her mental and emotional state with surprising complexity and truth. I loved little Althea. She was absolutely precious and could be as fiery and protective as her mother, as she showed in her first meeting with Nate.
I didn’t particularly appreciate how Eliza was so quick to want to give in to her father’s demands at various points in the story. She was never as alone as she thought, and she did have protection from a variety of sources. I just hated that whenever things started to look like they were (or even might) be going sideways that one of her first thought was that she should just go back to her father, accept the heinous older man as her husband, and give up her child to protect her from being drawn in to her grandfather’s vicious world. I also thought the title was wrong for this book. The use of the words “Wicked Earl” make you believe that this book has some naughtiness at some level to it, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, this is actually a very well-thought-out and well-written story of a woman who has been traumatized most of her life finding true happiness, love, and her happily ever after.
Owen by Tony Riches
Ebook available at Amazon
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Paperback available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble
Owen*
Fictionalized Story about the Start of the Tudor Dynasty
This fascinating historical fiction novel is told from the perspective of Owen Tudor, whom we learn about through the book as the unlikely Welsh progenitor of the Tudor dynasty of England. He is, in fact, Henry VIII’s great-grandfather. In this book, the author has worked with limited historical sources to form a plausible story about Owen Tudor, his wife, and their sons. The book can be a little dense at times, especially when detailing some history and relationships between characters, but I still found this book to be an intriguing look at a person who shaped much of late medieval English history because of the impact of his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. His life, as depicted here had incredible ups and downs, as did his children’s. This is very accessible even though it deals with weighty historical subjects, but it is not necessarily an easy or light read.
Date with a Werewolf by Lisa Daniels
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Date with a Werewolf*
Not My Favorite by this Author
I have enjoyed other books by Lisa Daniels, including the first one in this series as well as her Six Isles series. While I like the hero in this book, and I love following his thoughts, I could never quite identify with the heroine, so this book didn’t quite work for me. I think I was turned off at first by the level of profanity, as I don’t remember that being as much of an issue in the other books I’ve read by her. I am just turned off by excessive profanity in books, as I think they tend to be the crutch of authors who don’t write so well (and I don’t believe this author falls in that category). I grew up reading books that didn’t have a lot of profanity, so it is always jarring when I read such in books. I also didn’t like her cavalier attitude about sex. In this book, the relationships between the sisters are fraught with some tension, and the hero actually walks into a circumstance that is perhaps more than he bargained for, with the state of the dilapidation of the ranch as well as the broken family relationships between the siblings due to their upbringing. I wish I could say that I liked this more, because I do like most of the other books by this author, but this one just didn’t do it for me.
The Duke and the Damsel by Cinnamon Worth and Kay Springsteen
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The Duke and the Damsel*
Not Able to Get Past Not Liking Hero
In a departure from most Regency books about a compromise, both the hero and heroine at the heart of the story are determined not to be thrust into an unwelcome marriage. The heroine had decided that being a spinster was her best course of action after she lost an early love. If she is to marry, she wishes to do so only for love, but that is becoming more and more unlikely the older she gets. When they are discovered in a compromising state, the hero believes that he can buy the silence of the observers, but the heroine’s uncle has other ideas. To help the young woman, the hero decides to choose potential suitors from amongst his friends that might make an ideal husband for her.
I felt like this story had several plot holes. We’re told a little about the heroine’s first love, but we don’t really know the full story of their romance and what their relationship was truly like that would make her decide it was best to remain a spinster. There’s also a bad guy in the story, of course, but that just kind of fizzled out without any resolution. I found the language of the book to be somewhat stilted. I imagine the author is trying to mimic what she believes are Regency speech and language patterns, but it just doesn’t work and is more distracting than engaging. When the hero and heroine first meet, he comes across as a real jerk, and since the story is of novella length, I didn’t learn enough about his character or see enough of a growth arc to get past my initial bad feelings about him. For me, for a romance to work, I have to like the hero—finding him swoon-worthy is even better—and I have to believe that he is the best choice for the heroine. Unfortunately, that did not happen here.
Palatino for the Painter by Jessa Archer
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Palatino for the Painter*
Mystery of Friend’s Past is Solved
In this second installment of the series, a ghost from Wren and Ruth’s past comes back to haunt them. Their dearest friend from high school in the 1980s disappeared back then. The girl’s parents just said she went to Nashville to seek fame and fortune as a singer, but the best friends knew that something wasn’t right, but no one would listen to the teenage girls. Flash forward to today, and the friend’s car is pulled out of the local lake on the same day that their deceased high school English teacher has left behind a set of eerie paintings of the lake for Ruth. What happened to their friend?
The Tidy Guide to Writing a Novel by Rachel Aukes
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, Scribd, 24 Symbols, Thalia, Mondadori, Angus & Robertson, and Bol.de
The Tidy Guide to Writing a Novel*
Might Help a Real Beginner Get Started
This is a super short guide about how to write a novel. There are only four chapters. The second chapter gives tips for planning, whether you are a plotter or pantser (or somewhere in between, like most of us are); she does this in very broad strokes. In the third chapter, she goes over more precisely what she calls Little Ups as well as more specific information about the novel writing process. Little Ups, I think, is an odd phrase; they’re meant to motivate people to write in short stages, which could give a sense of accomplishment as you fulfill each milestone.
The book does give a thumbnail sketch of one writing process, which may or may not work for every writer. While there are some good tips and hints, it doesn’t feel like there is much substance to the book. You won’t really learn how to write a novel by reading this book, although you may be encouraged to do so. There is nothing really new here hasn’t been talked about in more detail in other books, magazines, and writers’ forums. But if you’re relatively new to writing (or are considering writing a novel), you might find this book is one that can help with your new author mindset and get to you heading in the right direction.
A Wallflower’s Folly by Amanda Mariel
Available at Amazon, iBooks, Google Play, Scribd, Thalia, and Bol.de
A Wallflower's Folly*
A Poorly Written Regency
I love a good Regency Romance—it is my favorite sub-genre of historical romance—but unfortunately, this is not one of them. The book is very short and suffers from a malady common to novellas: the dreaded information dump. And this happened not just once but twice. First, there was a data dump from the heroine and then a data dump from the hero. Despite that this excessive and repetitive information, I still didn’t feel like I got to know these characters. The book is full of so many errors with grammar, punctuation, spelling, and usage that it was exceedingly distracting. Did the heroine have “ill-manors”? The wrong form of too/to was used on more than one occasion. Words like “deuce” were misspelled (duce… really??). I could go on for paragraphs at how many things were just wrong, wrong, wrong. The book ended very abruptly as well.
I actually thought this was a good premise for a Regency romance (and was even looking forward to reading it), but it was so poorly executed that I cannot recommend it at all.
Count Your Hexes by Wendy Meadows
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
Count Your Hexes*
Great Start to a New Series
What a delightful start to a new cozy mystery series! And it does feel like a beginning in several ways. There is definitely a hint of future romance, and the protagonist, Mimi, is coming to understand that she has a magical bent. Not everything is fully resolved in this book, though the central mystery is (of course), which makes me anticipate book two!
I have read several of Wendy Meadows books, and I find that she has a way of writing in deep third-person point of view that draws you right into the story and the protagonist’s world. Even though this is a murder mystery, she is able to inject humor on occasion, and the relationship between Mimi and her dog, Baxter, is absolutely adorable (and I’m not even really a pet person). The author seems to have a good sense of timing; I love that she put the murder right up front (around the 6% mark), as I’ve read a couple of mysteries lately that make us wait to find the dead body. An interesting cast of characters populates this book, and much seems to be going on in this small town Maine town, both below the surface and what can be seen. I quite enjoyed watching this story unfold, and I look forward to the next book in the series.
See You Soon Broadway by Melissa Baldwin
Available at Amazon only
Free with Kindle Unlimited
See You Soon Broadway*
A Good Life or a Dream?
In an unusual move for books of this nature, protagonist Maris actually has a very good life at the start of the book. She has loving parents, a good friend who is also her roommate, and a very attentive and loving boyfriend, Kyle. Maris has more than many people, but she has dreams bigger than the life that she is currently leading. She is a vocal teacher who has dreams of being on Broadway. She is at a crossroads in more ways than one and doesn’t know whether she should pursue her dream in New York or stay where she is. She finds inspiration in her grandmother’s journals from the 1940s.
At times, it felt like the author was trying too hard to affect a younger woman’s way of thinking and speech. Some of it came off as unrealistic. There were times when I absolutely felt sorry for Kyle because I felt like she only cared about herself and not really about him. I know this is chick lit, so that’s supposed to be okay. But I don’t like it when a protagonist, even in chick lit, cares only about themselves.
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