Review: Duck For Cover & Other Tales: A Collection Of Short Stories by Barbara Venkataraman

 Genre: Short Story Collection

Description:

A collection of a variety of short stories described as “topical, relatable and just plain fun” that “deal with friendship, kinship and the complexities of the modern world,” among other topics.

Author:

An attorney and mediator specializing in family law, Barbara Venkataraman is also an author with a variety of different books. She’s written a series of mysteries, a few collections of short stories. She’s written non-fiction as well, with a fun book about grammar and even co-wrote a memoir with her son about his experience as a activist who helped exonerate four men falsely accused of rape in Florida in the 1940s.

Appraisal:

A collection of fourteen short stories which average a touch less than 1,000 words each. Each story and the book as a whole definitely makes for a quick read, but it’s a good one. What I liked about the stores is that they all have a twist at the end, something you don’t see coming that is just about the opposite of where you thought the story was going, but that also makes perfect sense when you get there. Short story fans should love this one. I sure did.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

Format/Typo Issues:

No significant issues.

Rating: ***** Five Stars

Reviewed by: BigAl

Approximate word count: 13-14,000 words

Review: Goods & Effects by Al Schnupp

 Genre: Literary Fiction

Description:

“Devastated by the death of her husband and sons, Hannah Mercer sells the family farm and creates a store and living quarters in a delivery truck. As she travels several circuits selling her wares, Hannah becomes the heart of a network of interlinking lives: Nathan owns the motel where Hannah often parks her truck. Darla is a young and talented deaf artist, whose parents let her accompany Hannah on her rounds. Wanda, the sassy receptionist at a hardware distribution center, has larger ambitions. Naomi, wife of the pious Mennonite deacon, entertains fantasies of sexual freedom. Frank, a gentle farmer with a chronically-ill wife, harbors great affection for Hannah, but has troubling biases. LeRoy is a black farmer and talented singer, yet his family is subjected to racial terrorism. Velma owns a woodworking shop. Is she a good match for Vivian, Ronan County's elegant, lesbian librarian?

Larry... Maddie ... Tom... Molly. As time passes and Hannah's relationships deepen, her faith diminishes but her vision of humanity expands. Hannah Mercer is a clever problem-solver, a shrewd schemer, a spinner of tender lies, an advocate for justice, and a dream weaver.”

Author:

A former member of the faculty at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo where he worked in the Theatre and Dance Department, Al Schnupp is now retired. While his education and career has been almost exclusively in the dramatic arts, he has had a couple of screenplays that he’s reworked into books.

Appraisal:

When I finished this novella and was pondering what I thought about it a few thoughts were easy. I liked it, largely because I liked the main character, Hannah, as well as most of the other characters who appear frequently, especially Darla, the talented deaf artist who, although she has good parents, got a third parent in Hannah.

But I realized that what the point of the story was, unlike what you’d get in many genres whether thriller, mystery, romance, fantasy, or the vast majority of other genres of fiction, wasn’t clear. I think part of that is the literary fiction genre that this book falls into doesn’t create as many expectations for a story to fit. I also pondered whether the development of this book, originally a screenplay idea the author had started on years before that he decided to turn into a novel, might have something to do with it.

In the end I wasn’t sure if the author had something he hoped the reader would take away from the story or not, but I could think of several possibilities that ultimately come down to what the reader chooses to take away. In the meantime, it also allows the reader to experience something that they probably haven’t in real life. That includes life on the fringes of a Mennonite community in middle America in the early 60s, a bit of a look into the difficulties of being deaf, and many other experiences that most of us aren’t likely to go through. Even as I struggled to figure out why, the one thing I was sure of is that I was glad I’d gone on this journey and got to know Hannah and her cohorts.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

Format/Typo Issues:

No significant issues

Rating: **** Four Stars

Reviewed by: BigAl

Approximate word count: 35-40,000 words

Reprise Review: Ghost Walk by Melissa Bowersock

 Genre: Mystery/Ghosts

Description:

“Lacey Fitzpatrick is an ex-LAPD detective with an axe to grind. Tainted by the betrayal of her drug-dealing cop boyfriend, she’s on a quest to prove to herself—and the world—that she’s still a competent crime-fighter. In order to do that, she teams up with Sam Firecloud, a half-Navajo man who communicates with ghosts. With his talent and her research, they tackle troubling unsolved crimes, but their latest case is the toughest. They have to solve a murder—where no record of a murder even exists. Can Sam glean enough information from the victim’s ghost to unravel the mystery, and can Lacey convince the authorities that the murder actually happened?”

Author:

“Melissa Bowersock is an eclectic, award-winning author who writes in a variety of fiction and non-fiction genres: biography, contemporary, western, action, romance, fantasy, paranormal and spiritual. She has been both traditionally and independently published and is a regular contributor to the superblog Indies Unlimited. She lives in a small community in northern Arizona with her husband and an Airedale terrier. She also writes under the pen name Amber Flame.”

Learn more about Ms. Bowersock on her website or follow her on Facebook.

Appraisal:

I don’t normally gravitate toward mysteries but Sam Firecloud, a half-Navajo man who communicates with ghosts, hooked me. He’s very private and soft-spoken, he is going to take some time to get to know though. However, I really like what I have seen of him so far.

Lacey Fitzpatrick, an ex-LAPD detective, could be considered Sam’s opposite. She is all about facts, excels in research, and is good about fitting pieces together in cold case files. She is not quite sure what to make of Sam at first and would rather write him off as a quack. However, she becomes a believer from what he gleaned from a cold case file she had been working on before she left the force. Lacey further tests Sam’s abilities when he asks her if she would like to accompany him on another case he has been contacted about. With her interest piqued she follows along with more preparation for documenting his findings. This is where the story’s meat is.

Lacey is a smart, conscientious, but head-strong heroine. Her character development is more fully rounded than Sam’s, but I am excited to learn more about his introspective character. The twists in the story are captivating and not too farfetched to believe. I think this is going to be an enthralling new series to follow and I am looking forward to more from Lacey and Sam’s new partnership.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

FYI:

Ghost Walk is the first book in A Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud Mystery series.

Original review posted February 6, 2017.

Format/Typo Issues:

I found no issues with proofing or formatting.

Rating: ***** Five Stars

Reviewed by: ? wazithinkin

Approximate word count: 40-45,000 words

Review: Pirate: The Rock Band by E.Z. Prine

 Genre: Humor/Historical Fiction

Description:

“It’s summer 1984, and a lonely rock star desperate for a more normal life battles against the forces inside and outside the band that stand in his way

Jack St James, lead singer and songwriter for hard rock band Pirate, is not your average rock star. The boys in the band may be thrilled with the rock star lifestyle, but control freak Jack doesn’t do drugs and can’t stand to be touched. After four years of non-stop touring and recording, he’s had it with the loneliness and monotony of life on the road.

His dream life is now within reach – retiring to an estate in the English countryside, making a family, and playing music for fun – but only if the band makes it through the next ten days of their sold-out American tour with no major hiccups. Then he can escape the record company and have enough money to make his dream come true.

Jack soon discovers that everyone, consciously or unconsciously, is out to foil him: his duplicitous manager (and best friend) Dunk who wants the band to keep going, the lead and bass guitarists rebelling against his iron control, a conniving and coked-up record company executive, and a beautiful and infamous groupie sowing discord within the band. Not to mention a whiny and incompetent tour bus driver named Mick.

As they each discover in turn, Jack is not one to take anyone’s shenanigans lying down. Jack’s blood is up and the game is on.”

Author:

“E.Z. (‘Easy’) Prine writes about the escapades of Pirate, a fictional eighties hard rock band out of Manchester, England. The Beatles’ appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964 sparked what has become E.Z.’s lifelong devotion to ‘classic rock’ and fascination with those luminaries we call rock stars.

The Pirate series is E.Z.’s love letter to rock ’n’ roll and personal thank you to all the artists and supporting others who brought this amazing contribution to our world. May we always rock on.”

For more visit the website for Pirate and follow their Facebook page.

Appraisal:

While the obvious reader for this would be fans of rock music who came of age in the 70s and 80s, I can see it appealing to adult rock fans both older and younger than that. For the most part the band seems like the cliched wild partying, groupie loving, rock band cliché of that time. The exception is the frontman, Jack St James, who is obviously different than the cliché. It’s clear early on that he is focused on making sure this tour comes off without a hitch in order to collect on a bonus he’ll receive at the end of the tour. What isn’t clear is why that is so important to him and why it appears others are trying to interfere. Throw in a bunch of fun and interesting characters with their own aspirations and goals, a mysterious past for Jack that slowly comes to light, and the result was a fun and entertaining story that kept me trying to figure out where it was going the entire way. While some story threads resolved, this is the first book of a trilogy, so the ending does include a hint of an upcoming complication heading Jack’s way to keep you coming back for more.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

FYI:

Adult language and some adult-ish content. With an 80s rock band surrounded by groupies, what else would you expect?

Format/Typo Issues:

No significant issues.

Rating: ***** Five Stars

Reviewed by: BigAl

Approximate word count: 110-115,00 words

Review: End Man by Alex Austin

 Genre: Science Fiction

Author

Alex Austin is a Los Angeles-based journalist, novelist, and playwright. He cites numerous awards for his work.

Description:

Protagonist Raphael Lennon’s pursuit of a mystery “unearths the secrets of his own phobia-plagued life and the inner workings of Norval, whose corporate ambitions include a nightmarish spin-off of its product. Raphael must stop them or he’ll never be free.”

Appraisal:

End Man initially reads as a futuristic allegory. The story’s antihero, Raphael, is given the name of an archangel in Jewish literature. Raphael’s job is to track down individuals, “possums,” who have gone off the digital grid by faking their deaths. The company he works for sells data of the dead and is highly profitable. The reason for locating possums involves a post-life enterprise. Raphael has dromophobia, a fear of crossing streets, which confines his life to an area one mile square.

All of which is fare for introspection into the human condition: Is the economic worth of an individual today more or less than the value of data corporations gather and sell; does an Internet presence create an historical afterlife for run-of-the-mill folks; can we break free of the boundaries we place on ourselves?

Raphael is told a prophecy that he will die in 13 days. Rather than give up, he is driven by curiosity and a moral gyroscope to continue searching for a particular possum, even after his company ordered him to stop. His search reveals more about himself than the truth of whether the possum is alive or dead. Does a search for truth give life meaning?

Or do I read too much into Mr. Austin’s work?

It’s hard to imagine that quality of writing happened by accident, but not impossible. The novel concludes with a disappointing comic-bookesque deus ex machina. Next comes a cute epilog that has an utterly vapid final line.

One wonders what the author intended.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

FYI:

Some language not suitable for young readers

Format/Typo Issues:

None

Rating: ***** Five stars

Reviewed by: Sam Waite

Approximate word count: 90-95,000 words

Reprise Review: Wisdom of Fools: stories of extraordinary lives by Phil Harvey

Genre: Short Story Collection

Description:

This a collection of eight stories by Phil Harvey which its Amazon puff says “will appeal to fans of Jonathan Franzen, Philip Roth and Martin Amis, and is right at home with some of the greatest famous short story collections.” Six of them are contemporary, two are science fictionish.

Author:

If you want to find out more about Phil Harvey, or connect with him, then this is a good place to start: http://www.humanmade.net/phil-harvey

Appraisal:

These are meaty stories. The author turns out to be one of those treasured finds in whom, as a reader, one may place absolute trust.

The eight stories are delightfully varied. Nevertheless, they do have aspects in common. I would describe them all as having both a visceral foundation and as many layers as an onion. Harvey sketches in characters at the same time as he develops the story – no hanging around to see the set and meet the cast here. Not a word is wasted, which is essential when constructing short stories. The story is underway from the first sentence: the pace and length are perfectly judged – and at the end is a payoff, which one had not seen coming, which is perfect and thought-provoking. Harvey is a man who really understands the short form in fiction and uses it beautifully. The Amazon puff (above) names several writers of short fiction in whose company these stories can stand. I hereby add Ernest Hemingway – yes, Harvey is THAT good.

My favourite (and it’s a hard choice) is Virgin Birth which looks at particularly difficult moral choices that might surround a surrogate pregnancy – the sort of choices that I’ve never been encouraged to think about before. I found it revelatory.

This is a short book. One can absorb a story in a sitting. Even if short fiction isn’t your usual fare I urge you to give these a go. If you’re still wrinkling your nose at the idea, Harvey has longer fiction available. This is an author well worth discovering.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

FYI:

Original review posted January 19, 2017.

Format/Typo Issues:

No infelicities to report, except for the three typos in one story.

Rating: ***** Five Stars

Reviewed by: Judi Moore

Approximate word count: 25-30,000 words

Review: Trojan Walk by Melissa Bowersock

 Genre: Paranormal/Mystery

Description:

“Sweltering under the summer heat of LA in July, Lacey Fitzpatrick begins planning an Alaskan cruise getaway for herself and her partner Sam, but her efforts are being constantly interrupted by annoying phone calls. Whoever it is, the person calls, says nothing, and hangs up. Then Sam starts getting the same kind of calls. The first possibility the duo considers is that some criminal they helped incarcerate is purposely irritating them or taking out a petty revenge, but after doing a bit of research, Lacey discovers that the caller—and the reason for the calls—is far more disturbing and complex. Now the question is, can the paranormal investigators really do anything to help?”

Author:

“Melissa Bowersock is an eclectic, award-winning author who writes in a variety of fiction and non-fiction genres: paranormal, biography, western, action, romance, fantasy, spiritual, and satire.”

For more visit Ms.Bowersock’s website and follow her on Facebook.

Appraisal:

Although I’ve only read three of the now 35 books in this series I’ve found them entertaining and fun reads. They all have a bit of a pattern with specific qualities that make for a good story. One of those qualities that some might like and others not is that they are on the short side, around 30,000 words. This makes for a fast read and a story that moves along, never dragging. The mix of things I’ll call “not real” (the paranormal aspects of the story) and the real, specifically figuring out the mystery involved in each story, along with the well-drawn characters, always draws me in. I never have an issue suspending disbelief about the paranormal aspects as I’m reading, even though I don’t believe real life ghosts actually exist.

This particular installment in the series fits the pattern with some unique aspects. One is Cassie, the person Lacey and Sam are trying to help, is an easy-to-like kid who it turns out has a couple different ghosts that need to be handled although in different ways. Figuring this out as well as figuring out a few other things that ultimately turn out to be clues to the main mystery keeps Sam, Lacey, and the reader guessing to the very end. Ms Bowersock has delivered another good one.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

FYI:

Although this is book 35 in the Lacey Fitzpatrick and Sam Firecloud mystery series each story stands alone.

Format/Typo Issues:

No significant issues.

Rating: ***** Five Stars

Reviewed by: BigAl

Approximate word count: 30-35,000 words

Review: Upriver by Martin Roy Hill

 

Genre: Thriller

Description:

“NCIS Special Agent Linus Schag is no stranger to violence and bloodshed, but when he’s sent to Iraq to take custody of two Navy SEALs suspected of murder, he finds himself thrust into a manmade inferno as coalition forces fight to free northern Iraq from the Islamic extremist group called ISIS.

The explosion of an IED allows the SEALs, suspected of killing a fellow commando, to escape and flee up the Tigris River in a stolen Navy patrol boat. Schag pursues the SEALs in another boat assisted by an Army criminal investigator, a vengeful Iraqi interpreter, and a hostile Navy boat crew. Facing danger at each bend in the river, Schag and his companions endure ambushes, firefights, and friendly fire as he tries to discover the secret that lures the SEALs straight into the dark heart of an ISIS-made hell on earth.”

Author:

“Martin Roy Hill is the author of two national award-winning series—the Linus Schag, NCIS, thrillers and the Peter Brandt mysteries—the USCG DSF-Papa sci-fi thrillers, Eden: A Sci-Fi Novella, and a collection of short stories, DUTY. He is a former journalist and national award-winning investigative reporter for newspapers and magazines. His nonfiction work has appeared in Reader’s Digest, LIFE, Newsweek, Omni, the Los Angeles Times, and many others. His short fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, ALT HIST: The Journal of Historical Fiction and Alternate History, Nebula Rift, Mystery Weekly, Crimson Streets, and others.”

Appraisal:

This is part of a series featuring Linus Schag (sounds like shag, the c is silent). He’s an agent for the NCIS, the internal law enforcement division of the US Navy. In this story he and his cohorts are chasing two Navy SEALs suspected of murder into an area of Iraq that is essentially at war. Needless to say, things are intense. The story has a lot of things at play to reach a resolution. Not only does Schag need to figure out where the escapees are likely to be headed beyond the obvious “upriver,” but they need to be careful to stay as under-the-radar as possible from enemy forces (ISIS in this case). The army crew tasked to assist him complicates things at times due to the normal competitiveness and friction between different branches of the US military. Then they have an Iraqi native accompanying them as a translator who makes some of their crew nervous and has goals of his own that also complicates things. The result is a unique story that keeps the reader guessing as to how or if things are going to work out.

Buy now from:            Amazon US        Amazon UK

FYI:

Although part of a series, this book stands alone. Reading the prior books in the series to follow this story is not necessary.

Format/Typo Issues:

Review is based on an advance reader copy which might not reflect the final product, so we can’t judge this area.

Rating: **** Four Stars

Reviewed by: BigAl

Approximate word count: 40-45,000 words