BLOG TOUR: Flower Child has another review!
This week's book reviews (with links to longer reviews on gather, and coffee recommendations for readers)...
Starting, of course, with Christine Amsden's Touch of Fate; a novel that combines mystery, detective work, lives gone wrong and lives beginning to go write, plus intriguing touches of faith and fate, this one's a really pleasing and satisfying read. Enjoy with a 3-star well-balanced, full-flavored coffee.
Heading further into the realms of sci-fi, but still firmly grounded in real-world issues, is P.I. Barrington's Isadora Daystar. A drug-addicted prostitute/assassin finds she has more humanity left in her than she imagined after her latest "hit" goes wrong. Once it gains direction her life almost threatens to make sense, and the story resolves itself wonderfully. You might want a 5-star bold dark coffee to drink with this dark tale.
Isadora's a soldier in a future galaxy, but Melissa Foster's Come Back to Me deals with those affected by war in our present times. Tess's husband goes to Iraq as a photographer. She learns she's pregnant just before she gets the news that he's died, and the novel follows the twin tales of a man struggling to return to his wife and a woman struggling to come to terms with his death. Iraqi and American concerns and characters are drawn with equal skill, making this a really intriguing novel for our times. Read with a 4-start elegant complex coffee. (And look out for Melissa Foster's book tour too.)
Another novel of love and loss is Beyond the Quiet by Brenda Hill. Finding the past wasn't quite as she imagined after losing her husband, Lisa struggles to rebuild her life and memories and restore lost relationships. A tough page-turner with a good ending, this is one to read with a 5-star intense cup of coffee.
Chocolicious, by Geraldine Solon, tells of another woman facing loss and hoping to rebuild her life. Chocolate plays a part, as the title suggests, though it takes a while to appear. Enjoy this one with a 2-star lively coffee as the story springs from disaster to disaster to hope.
Finally two non-fiction books. I don't usually review this type of book, but, after all, I am dreaming of earning my living as a writer, so perhaps some books on the world of business and creative decision-making wouldn't go amiss.
Dilemmas, Dilemmas, by Julie Garland McLellan,is fascinating tour of board-room problems, from interpersonal to legal to moral and more. It's nicely laid out with a table of cases at the start, and well-presented with answers from three different experts in each case. Plus readers are invited to comment and consider the answers to determine what seems best to them, and why. Drink some 1-star mild crisp coffee with this--don't want too much caffeine while solving dilemmas.
Creatively Ever After, by Alicia Arnold, uses the fairy-tale story of Jack and Jill to teach creative problem-solving--just how will they learn to get water without breaking crowns? It's an interesting approach teaching good lessons with just enough whimsy to maybe keep students' ready to learn. Another one for that 1-star mild crisp coffee to keep the brain actively seeking solutions.
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