P-Date: 2024
Genre: SciFi
Review: This was a lot of fun. The author crams loads of interesting action into a novella. Had this been a full length novel, an easy 4-5 stars. But you all know my rule: Max of three stars is the highest rating a novella can receive.
Rachel, write a full length novel so we can enjoy this story for a few days rather than a few hours.
Rating: 3.5/5
P-Date: 2024
Genre: Fantasy
Review: This was a fun read made for both YAs and adults. The story line is well built with some creative quests thrown in to make it interesting. The MCs were never described in terms of what they look like but all of the other supporting characters, were. Perhaps the cover art suffices.
A quick read that is lightly entertaining.
Rating: 3.5/5
P-Date: 2024
Genre: Steampunk
Review: Another great installment in the land of Carsolan with many twists and turns that will keep you up late in the evening. All the characters are well buildt and fun to follow.
This world is unique and that is what I love about it. You might say that it is edgey steampunkian 1800’s industrial London with some Oliver Twist thrown in on top of Gangs of New York.
Rating: 4.7/5
P-Date: 2024
Genre: Fantasy
Review: A tale built like a wondrous tapestry, intricate in detail and expansive in color.
The characters literally jump off the page and into your mind-hole where they fluoresce into burgeoning life-like creations. It is a rare author that combines multiple facets into an integrated whole – utilize the movement of the story line action to introduce, embolden and grow the characters, and create expansive world building that is easy to visualize. Yeah it is formulaic yet hard to execute. Better have a dam good idea of what you want to build before hand.
I am like one of those blue heelers in the review game. I bite hard and quick if you turn your back. This year I have been blessed with some of the best writers newly encountered. Add Salinee to that short list.
Rating: 4.9/5
P-Date: 2024
Genre: Thriller
Review: This was a well written thriller that had some good movement. It was just predictable and somewhat boring. The characters were patterned after most movies where time is running out as terrorists implement their evil plans. Throw in a president an Ice cold CIA Deputy Director and an international caste of spies and Bingo! a movie is born.
Hard pass on this series.
Rating: 2.5/5
P-Date: 2023
Genre: SciFi
Review: Conflicted, you are. Hmmmm? Well, I really liked the world building for this alien landscape although the story line was borrowed from John Carter. Like Carter, douche noz……er Liam, arrives on an alien planet with superman like powers and helps the sundered and war torn masses, blah, blah. Despite the obvious rip-off, I thought the author did a good job building unique characters.
Overall an average work that trended towards duplicative emotional inner-dialogue. I think every chapter had the brat crying over his lost parents, either in real-time or in nightmares. Wah. “Crash this, crash that”. Fug. Repetitive instances does not a character build. Dom was also built with the tradgedies of his past. Again wah. Overuse of phrasing was in evidence with the “Rolling his/her eyes”.
This author is on the cusp. Let us see if there is a rise to greatness.
Rating: 3.3/5
P-Date: 2023
Genre: Fantasy/Steampunk
Review: I was really impressed with this work by a relatively unknown writer. This reeks of Holmes and Watson’s pursuit of the arch-evil network, replaced with Cast and Ellyx as our daring duo. The cover art is confusing as the descriptions of our duo is one of an older (graying) alchemist and a grown woman, not a little girl.
There is a tinge of the Steampunkian throughout this novel that plays really well with setting the impression of the world. Alchemy bridged with the mechanical and contraptions that are self-powered, as well as Vril powered gaslights invigorate the story line. Why even an airship is forthcoming. YES!
The character development is what really drives the story, as it is coupled impeccably to the movement.
Get this!
P-Date: 2024
Genre: Romance
Review: This is being sold as a mystery (which it isn’t) and a thriller. This is more along the lines of a romance novel with some daring do thrown in here and there to spice it up.
So, we have a hunky guy with tousled hair, a hot bod, shattered past, and a heart of gold running a detective agency. Check. His partner whom he has constant naughty thoughts about is a super sexy native american (part) and an orphan who wishes they could act on their obvious love and animal attraction. Check. Throw in the gruff but lovable Navy Seal who is always good for a handy plot device and bingo, the formula is set for another patterned “mystery”.
If you like thinly built characters and the constant physical commentary of the lustful kind and a biker gang that rides around with pirate masks and long swords threatening our super wonder duo, then this is for you.
Rating: 1.0/5
P-Date: 2024
Genre: Mystery/Fantasy
Review: This was a fun read albeit short in length. The characters are well built within the limits of the story line. The movement is well paced and the world building is kind of meh.
Although the culprit is easy to spot within the first few chapters, I don’t think that this was the point of the novel. The point was to test how far to bend the genre by mixing mystery and fantasy as well as introducing an MC that will most likely return in another installment.
The editors need to make another go at reducing the grammatical errors and the paragraph duplications. If this was a longer novel, an easy 4 stars.
Rating: 3.5/5
P-Date: 2024
Genre: SciFi
Review: Is it ok that I don’t get it? A story line that is bereft of empathy, inter-change, emotion, and communication makes for inventive writing but leaves the reader empty. Emotionally wilted, our MC does not even question her surroundings and the circumstances in which she finds herself. Her motivations are purely self-centered as evidenced by her constant self-recrimination. Maybe that is natural but within this inner conflagration she will suddenly go to a moon or go to a planet and allow weird shjt to happen and then it is never given any thought again. It is like she is in a constant state of short-term memory loss.
The writer creates for themselves a menagerie of prose that is supposed to be creative/clever. In application this prose or poetical writing is perhaps intentionally vacant in hopes that it adds tension. What it really does is annoy this reader. Nothing connects. Not the dialogue, not the scenes, not the instances of exchange between people and definitely not the science part of fiction.
This is a novel of what could have been. Character exchanges were stilted and bland. Saying one word responses to serious questions does not make the scene pivotal. It is intentionally vague to mask the lack of effort it takes to weave some mystery into the work. In short, I just got angrier with every page turned.
I know I am the lone outcast not exhibiting gushing praise because I need to show everyone how connected and hip I am in understanding “eco-prose” and “lyrical” this and that while promoting drivel.
At any rate, I dug a hole for this book and buried a dead racoon on top of it.
Rating: 1.5/5
Viking Jam 