The Galactic Star Force Battle Fleet is a cobbled together remnant of human society that is trapped in a system filled with hostile aliens. Some of the humans are kept as a foodstuff by one alien race, while the group that managed to escape and desperately wanted to free them is being maniacally attacked by another alien race that simply wants to see humans completely oblitereated.

The author obviously knows a great deal about fighting techniques and strategy. It's obvious in each battle scene that this is a guy who knows exactly what he's plotting. Most of the time, it's easy for the reader to get a very clear idea of exactly what is happening with both the enemy and the heroes. The battle scenes did flat-out work in terms of consistency and strategy. There were nearly transparent rules that were followed strictly for tactical abilities with both groups as well as equipment performance. The physics in this book neither get ignored nor do they disappear conveniently.
There are also some very helpful definitions and specifications at the front of the book, especially if the reader is starting the series with the second volume.

However, this book suffered greatly from an overabundance of repitition. Everything that happens is explained at least twice and it's usually from the same perspective. If the reader missed something important in the plot the first time, they have no need to fear, they'll get a chance for a recap in the not-too distant future.

The author's martial arts discipline also left a stamp all over this book. That isn't necessarily a terrible thing, but in this one, the stamp was at least page-sized and the letters were bright red. His heroes were very strictly honor and duty-bound to the point that there isn't even the flicker of doubt that they will always do the right thing and they will always do their absolute best to save their fallen comrades. The solidarity and hope that the humans show in this book is a beautiful dream, but the problem is that humans tend to get more complex than that. People have doubts, lose their convictions, or get scared on a regular basis and those things often get in the way of the principals that just about everyone wishes they could live by.

As for the aliens, well, both races are terrible, evil creatures. The aliens are impulsive and ruled by their greed and pride, which is what tends to get them into trouble when battles against humans are concerned. Sometimes, the aliens are so completely stupid that it's laughable. Certainly, everyone makes dumb mistakes now and then, but it's hard to believe that an alien race with such a glaringly obvious species-wide character flaw would become a conquering force of any sort of threat level.

The world of this book is very sharply delineated. Those who live by honor and adhere to duty, common sense, and careful plans of action are bound to succeed, whereas those who heed their impulses and their individual pride are doomed to fail. The bad guys are very, very bad and the good guys are very, very good.

So where does that leave this book? On a pure science fiction level, it tends to dissolve into specifications, statistics, and jargon and the story is set up and knocked down so succinctly that there's nothing to get really excited about. However, if applied as a sort of philisophical allegory, it might work as a very nice thought experiment for a class. The book holds little margin for error or misinterpretation within its pages and so could be used to help illustrate differences in Eastern and Western thought as well as helping to get people thinking about what it would actually take to get people to stop fighting amongst each other for silly, petty reasons. The book is certainly a call for peace and for that, it's very difficult to fault the author. He's just trying to show a better humanity striving its way towards a utopian existence.

Some mention should be made for the diagrams and illustrations in the book. They're very well-done pencil sketches by artist Dion Hammil and while it might have been nice to see them as full pages in the book the fact that they were included was a very nice bonus.

This book is one that I would recommend to a middle-school or junior high-school aged boy, especially one who hasn't got a great deal of time for reading. The repetitiveness of the book would serve him well if he has to put the book down for a length of time before he gets a chance to read it again. It could be the kind of book that would get boys to read more, especially if they prefer to have far more action sequences in their entertainment and it offers enough in the way of ethical and moral questions that it could probably get him thinking beyond the confines of this fictional world.

Usually, in a review, I mention what I liked about a book. I certainly think that's only fair to the writer and to those who would read this review. There isn't anything good that I can say about this one.

This author writes as though he opened up a thesaurus and started choosing the biggest words that he possibly could. There is no consideration given to the connotation of any of the words and the overall effect is the reading equivalent of walking past a perfume counter on Sample Day. It's both horrifying and overwhelming. I wish that I could simply say it's a matter of this not being my sort of book, however, I've read cyberpunk, nonfiction, mainstream fiction, slipstream fiction, horror, graphic novels, classic literature, splatterpunk, and "People" magazine-which all make the fact that I could not get into this book all the more surprising. I was trying to ignore a televised football game by reading and this book was so terrible, I couldn't even do that.

It's a jumbled mess of vignettes that might make a plot farther into the book, but at 100 pages, I had had enough and simply had to give up the idea ofslogging through it. Even worse, while the science fiction and fantasy traditions have a long and sometimes celebrated tendency to unhinge the English language into new and interesting words (some of which later get inducted into mainstream language), often by splicing elements of other languages together, there is a point where a work becomes impenetrable. This book is complete with a 27 page glossary at the end which a reader must reference almost endlessly and therefore disrupt the flow of the book. I've read "A Clockwork Orange" by Anthony Burgess, and I agree with his view that it didn't need a glossary for the Nadsat lingo he created because he wrote so skillfully that readers could use context clues to figure out the meanings. Shaun Von Dragen doesn't write well enough to pull off the amount of slang he so casually tosses around the pages.

Then, there's the uncredited use of two words that I immediately recognized from Mr. Burgess's novel, "glazzies" and "guttiwuts." I don't believe that they ought to be used without giving credit to the Nadsat language that Anthony Burgess created.

There are spelling errors and horribly mangled words that could have come from the George W. Bush Vocabulary Institute. There's no need to make up cumbersome words to express something that's already got a word to describe it. In addtion, when referring to pop culture, it might be a good idea to define all of the artists mentioned in a particular paragraph. Many people, I'm certain, are quite familiar with Paul Gauguin, yet that definition is included, while a similar reference is not available for H.R. Giger. Finally, when using a credited word from a movie as popular as "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" or a book as popular as "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", one should do one's best to make sure that they're actually using a word from that source. The word you were probably looking for was "scrumdilyumptious" not "scrumdilyicious."

This book is rife with these problems. I can't even in good conscience pass this book on to someone else because I couldn't bear the thought of inflicting it on them. Neil Gaiman gave some great advice in his webjournal about reading more than you write. I have trouble believing that Mr. Von Dragen does, because there's certainly no feeling for the reader that the author has a great love of and relationship with words. In Mr. Von Dragen's case, I believe that I would recommend he start his reading with those time-honored and wonderfully informative books by Strunk and White, "The Elements of Style" and "The Elements of Grammar."

“Killing Floor” by Lee Child is my first Lee Child book and the first in the Jack Reacher series. Jack is ex-military, so yes, this is a tough-guy thriller. And a page-turner it is. The opening starts with him being arrested as though he is a highly dangerous criminal. He knows he’s innocent and the whole first part of the book is about him trying to get out of jail (and the dangers of being in jail). Jack has become a self-declared drifter now that he is ex-military so it takes a few events and a sexy lady to convince him to help solve the local murder, mystery and mayhem.

The mystery plot itself is quite strong throughout the book, the pace is excellent. Jack is a tough-guy so there’s the usual suspension of disbelief required for various brawls, killings and fights. Most of it is handled pretty well, especially the first half. The author sets things up quite nicely with enough side plots that it’s never boring. The writing and descriptions, especially of handguns and fighting, are quite detailed and excellent. Many of the twists and turns were brilliant.

A few issues with the story kept this book from getting a higher rating. Jack is quite the “Encyclopedia Brown” multiple times during the story. Sometimes it works well; other times you’re left thinking, “well sure that theory fits, but I can think of half a dozen other ones just as plausible.” At the beginning when he does his Encyclopedia deductions, they are fairly harmless and believable; they setup his personality and the story. These early deductions are generally unimportant so you find no need to question them. However, as the story goes on, some of his “hunches” and deductions get a little too wild and way too accurate. Serendipity and luck starts to look pretty questionable. I was able to overlook these issues and still enjoy the story, but they did seem to crop up more and more often as the book neared the end. Perhaps worst of all, when one of the guilty parties was revealed, I just didn’t feel the setup was there nor the believability. It wasn’t that the answer was too pat, it was just that the tie-in wasn’t strong enough. Since there were multiple guilty parties, this flaw didn’t ruin the book, but it did disappoint me greatly because the rest of the culprits and their guilty actions were setup much better. There were absolutely brilliant clues and setups in this book, which unfortunately made those that weren’t, all the more obvious. A few other details that bothered me: Jack doesn’t shower often yet he does a lot of walking through muggy, hot weather…and it isn’t a huge problem with the sexy woman or with him. There’s a description of how he just throws clothes away and buys new ones rather than do laundry, but given activities that involved a lot of running, fighting, and blood this detail came across as blatantly ridiculous. I think he bought clothes twice. I also didn’t believe the explanation that he didn’t know how to do laundry and had never done it. Ever.

Most of the characterization in the book was quite strong, but at the end, a few relationships were wrapped up so quickly it felt pretty inconsistent with earlier actions and motivation. This wasn’t a huge thing, but again, the devil was in the details and sometimes the little things just didn’t add up.

Overall this is an exciting read. It’s easily strong enough to hold up as a beach read or a weekend jaunt away from reality. As a first novel, it’s damn good, and I suspect that in later novels some of the missing details or inconsistencies will not be as evident. It will also be interesting to see how the author develops Jack’s character. There is a lot of room for growth here. As a “hobo” character, the author will have a lot of play in settings and characters.

Two Minute Rule by Robert Crais is a standalone suspense. Surprisingly, it contained less violence than Crais’ Elvis Cole PI series. Two Minute Rule is the story of an ex-convict just getting out of jail after ten years. He wants to change his life, get back in touch with the woman he wished he had married and also with his estranged son. Within the first couple of chapters, Max Holman is hit with enough bad luck the reader would understand if he just gave up and asked to go to back to prison. He has no friends except cons and ex-cons. His policeman son has been murdered. Max wants revenge, but he isn’t a violent criminal; he prided himself on robbing banks during which no one got hurt. Unfortunately, he has no resources, a minimum wage job, and as he starts to put together clues about who killed his son, his criminal past means the cops completely ignore him.

Just when you’re sure there is no out, Crais twists and turns the characters. Crais doesn’t waste words, which makes his writing style good as an audio book, although this probably isn’t his fastest-paced work. Some of the pacing is due more to emotion than action and there are parts of the book that push the believability limit. Several times when Max is pushed, violence is the natural route—Crais does a good job of mixing it up so the reader is never sure just when Max might explode and when he will be able to resist the temptation to fall back on easier means of solving problems—like violence or stealing. For an ex-bank robber with at best a high school education Max is an awfully nice guy and very well spoken. Crais does a very good job of setting expectations and giving plausible action/reactions even if there were spots where I didn’t quite believe in the grace of people involved.

The first chapter starts off with a typical Crais bang; the next three or four are a bit slow as Max’s character is developed. Max wasn’t an easy character to like, partly because he was a criminal, and partly because you don’t want to get too tied up with him in case he fails. Support characters were wonderfully drawn with just enough information to make them real. Throughout the book, there’s a sense of seeing the best intentions of the bad guys and also a sense that if they could just live long enough, maybe they’d find the motivation to change. This book gives a tiny glimpse of how difficult it is for an ex-convict to walk out of jail and stay straight. Human weakness being what it is, there are a lot of failures, but this book is about one guy, a heroic effort and lots of gray areas between right and wrong.

The book worked for me—I wanted Max to succeed and to surmount the impossible challenges. When he was tempted beyond reason and fell back a few steps, I was rooting for him. I think Crais did a masterful job of taking a criminal and turning him into a mostly good guy in some four hundred plus pages.

Just as a side opinion, my husband who reads almost zero fiction, thought the book could have been shorter. Once he gets the general idea, he's pretty much ready to just get to resolution. Just before the last two CDs, we stopped and ate dinner. During dinner we discussed probably resolutions to the story and by and large, we nailed the ending--although we did not guess the perp.

Christopher Graybill did an outstanding job reading Two Minute Rule—I’d rate his reading a 10—he used various voices to separate characters, paced well, and enunciated clearly. I’d listen to audio books done by him again.

Elaine Viets has won both the Agatha and Anthony—her book, “Murder with Reservations,” is truly is reminiscent of Agatha Christie works—not too scary, but involving a murder. In the book, Helen Hawthorne stars as amateur sleuth while she cleans hotel rooms. The series is based on odd-jobs like this, all made probable because Helen is moving constantly as she hides out from her lousy ex-husband. In “Murder with Reservations” there are three mysteries really: Will Helen’s ex-husband find her and ruin her life (worse than it already is)? Will Helen figure out who killed her co-worker Rhonda? And last but not least, Will Helen find the money that an old bank robber might have left hidden in the hotel?

Viets weaves her plots around a somewhat unlikely character: Helen shows an amazing lack of spine when it comes to all three mysteries. She could face her ex-husband in court, but chooses not to. This is somewhat believable because, after all, Helen stayed married to the cheating scum for many years before leaving. Helen finds Rhonda’s body, which requires some nerve and fortitude…but then her character immediately returns to a faded, worried wall-flower to avoid being noticed by the police. The book is a mad combination of “I must do what is right” and “I must run away faster.”

I found the occasional strange analogy used by Viets rather disconcerting. Perhaps she shouldn’t write on an empty stomach:

“Her broad bosom was twin cabbages, her tight white hair was a cauliflower, and her powerful arms were blue-ribbon zucchini.”

It’s enough to put your off your vegetables for years. And it didn’t stop there.

Another woman was, “…an odd creature with a round white face like a cocktail onion.”

It wasn’t always vegetable matter: “The cheerios stared back at Helen like a heap of eyeless skulls.” Hmm. To each their own cheerio!

Helen does add two and two and uncovers the killer in the end; it is done in a very reasonable manner. Not only that, but the other mysteries and conflicts were resolved as well. All in all, I think cozy readers will find the book satisfying with its various plots, a side romance and the occasional red-herring.

I admit I only read “Monkey’s Raincoat,” the first Elvis Cole mystery by Robert Crais because I heard he had a book out that was all about Joe Pike, Cole’s sidekick. Now, never having read any of Crais’ work, you may wonder why I cared about the sidekick. Simple: Joe Pike was described in a review along the lines of: the tall, dark, mysterious man that takes care of the ugly business when needed. Ah, mysterious. Quiet. Takes care of business. I was intrigued.

Of course the first order of business was to familiarize myself with the characters in order to determine if Joe Pike was indeed going to be mysterious and interesting. “Monkey’s Raincoat” is definitely a tough guy book. It has the wise-cracking, hard drinking PI, only he’s pretty young and not really jaded by life. It has the beautiful ladies that predictably fall into Cole’s lap. Cole is a rather strange blend of the typical hardcore PI mixed with a protective, sensitive type. In my opinion, the protective attributes were overdone—for example, there was a scene in the book where Cole picks a potential fight with a jerk giving a waitress a hard time. Well, fine, that was nice of Cole, but it failed to fit into the larger story, and the character had already shown his protective instincts by taking on the case at hand, quite possibly for free.

Just what was the case at hand? A damsel in distress, of course. Ellen’s husband has disappeared, along with her nine-year-old son. Cole suspects that husband Mort has run off with another woman, only there seems to be a lot of people looking for this other woman. Things get a little tighter when Cole’s client, Ellen, disappears. It becomes clear that someone was after Mort and not because he was a nice guy. He either knew something or had something important. Cole does a good job of following the clues with a satisfactory number of well-done shootouts and narrow escapes.

The story is fast-paced and the plot is quite believable—corruption in Hollywood, drug deals and of course, murder. Likeable characters are important and Crais does a good job of providing them. In the first half, I was a little disappointed; the women were looking like cardboard props. In the second half Crais pushed out some of the extraneous characters and concentrated on filling out Ellen. He never deviated from her early personality, but he grew the character in a very realistic fashion. The book would not have worked had he failed to create a woman character as important as the PI. The story and the crisis, after all, were about Ellen. Had she not come to the forefront and become less than a prop, it would have been impossible for me to care about the outcome. Luckily Crais came through.

Perhaps the strangest part of the book was the “sensitivity” of Cole that ricocheted between knowing women well and missing by a mile. Maybe I’ve just never met a guy that was sensitive and knowledgeable enough that when packing for a woman remembers not only her toothbrush, but her deodorant, gathers running shoes and purposely collects an outfit that matches well. The same Cole, as an affectionate gesture, squeezed a friend’s butt as he departed an office setting (she was a professional career type that he visited for some information.) Uh, no. I cannot see it happening. Don’t try this one at the office guys.

All in all, Monkey’s Raincoat was a fun read—and yes, I am intrigued enough by Joe Pike to go and read that adventure. I’m looking forward to it. Crais fleshes out characters well when he wants to; the book, “The Watchman” A Joe Pike novel, should be a good read.

Another beach read! As in the first Aaron Tucker Mystery, Jeffrey Cohen does a marvelous job of characterization in this third installation, As Dog is My Witness. The biggest strength of the series is the family setting, which is real enough to jump off the page.

Cohen is a genius in the way he weaves in his own real life knowledge—he, like the main character Aaron Tucker, has a son with Aspergers (a high-functioning form of autism.) In the book, Cohen manages to drop information about Aspergers without preaching. Ethan, the Aspergers character, is a mainstay in earlier books, but in this book, he plays an important part in solving the mystery.

The plot is fairly strong throughout, as is the side issue of Tucker managing a personal problem in the form of freeloading relatives. Tucker even managed to involve the mob in this caper and I truly enjoyed that mix-in—humor and light-heartedness are the key. Puns are part of Cohen’s style; in this particular book, especially at the beginning, they were a bit too frequent and distracting for me, but nothing that can’t be glossed over.

I would have liked to see a little more depth to the actual mystery/plot; something I thought was better developed in the first book of this series, “For Whom the Minivan Rolls.” While the side problems in “As Dog is My Witness” keep things moving, I think the ending suffered a tad from the lack of suspects. There’s a twist to the ending, but in this case, I think the simpler ending it seemed headed for would have not only made more sense, but sufficed.

Still, the book has heart, puns abound and the characters are easy to care about.

Bart Stewart is, apparantly, an author who is very uncomfortable with the idea of the contraction. Consquently his dialog is almost unbearably stiff and formal in all of the pieces in this short story collection. The one story where the staid language style is actually an asset is "The Jingle", which I found to be probably the best work in the book.

"The Jingle" takes place in Washington, D.C. amidst a crisis that threatens to overwhelm humanity stemming from the creation of a commercial jingle that literally drives the majority of the population insane. It's a great artistic retaliation against the kinds of commercials that crop up, especially during the Super Bowl, and seem to overtake a person's brain. All of the military dialog that takes place fits well with Stewart's peculiar speech writing.

The concepts of the other stories in the anthology are interesting and despite the awkward dialog, I was motivated to keep reading. A cycle of three stories, beginning with "The Statuary Cats" and ending with "The Kittens of the Statuary Cats" revels in a sort of B-horror movie feel that is unapologetically cheesy and still manages to entertain. A pair of stone cats are purchased or end up in the possession of various unwitting people. It's no surprise that the cats come alive and kill people but it seems that the point of the stories is not surprise or shock or even vague uneasiness. It's just a pure melding of horror and mystery that is meant to be enjoyed. The period piece "Theater on the Air" which takes place during Orson Welle's famous "War of the Worlds" broadcast seems a little out of place since there's no underlying fantasy element to it. It's a little bit of a psychology story and seems contrived and dull.

The later stories in the book, which include the aforementioned "The Jingle", are superior to the earlier stories. It feels like a chronological overview of the author's stories to date and the stories do get better towards the end of the book. "Dumpster of the Mind" was worthy of being an episode on "Outer Limits" or "the Twilight Zone", as was "The Brick Worker." These stories were more concise and play to Stewart's descriptive strengths, rather than allowing themselves to be hampered by people trying to speak.

Granted, taking out the less satisfactory pieces would make for a very slim book, which would probably make it harder to justify the cover price. I truly don't think the collection should be outright condemned. The story plots and the ideas most certainly weren't faulty and Stewart seems to have a real gift for pacing, but he really needs to have a little help with the dialog, as it breaks the rhythm and flow of his stories almost to the point of unreadability.

If you can, definitely try to read "The Jingle", "Dumpster of the Mind", "The Brick Worker", and "Condemned to Repeat It." Stewart really hits a stride in those stories that show real potential as a storyteller. As for the other stories, they might well be left to the Dream World, rather than the Real one.

Stephenie, her Mother and her friend, Eris are mysteriously transported to Arhka. A world of talking dragons and ageless vampires. She learns of her Mothers standing in this strange world and of the energy, Ith’yra which is used by the inhabitants of Arhka to wage war, a magic, that she and her Mother, are able to wield.

Dragged into a conflict she knows little about, dealing with the politics of the various species and asked to defend a strange world against alien invaders is a tall order for any young teenager. So what will she choose, to return to earth and her studies, or fight in a war for a world she knows little about.

Personal Thoughts – There are two main female characters in this story, that drive the plot and move the reader through the story. Stephenie is a young, tomboy, with a yearning for excitement. When she is transported to Arhka, her character changes, as she learns to wield the magic, Ith’yra, and fight for her independence as her domineering Mother continues to make decisions on her behalf.

Elise, her Mother, is a highly-strung character, with secrets about a strange life on Arhka and her role as a major power on that world. Once Stephenie and Elise are transported to Arhka, there begins a catalogue of events and conflicts that enables them both to so easily use the strange magic on this world. This can easily been explained for Elise, however, I found Stephenie’s easy adaptation of her new abilities didn’t read true. In fact I found Elise and Stephenie and Eris, the friend who is transported with the pair, so similar in their construction that I had to constantly check whom I was reading about. I felt there wasn’t enough character development for any of them to stand out and take me through this story.

I found the same lacking in all the male characters that were introduced in the story, they all read the same, none stood out as particularly original. The most memorable character is Drugstag, representing the dragon species of Arhka. I liked the novelty of a talking dragon and quite liked how this character developed. I have read this Heather Hayashi is involved with game development. And the action scenes did remind me a little of a gaming scenario. However, unlike gaming, good character development is essential for a novel and I was disappointed with the weak characters of this book

Book 2 – Rogue Angel

Annja Creed inheritor of St Joan’s sword and an archaeologist, hears of the discovery of Solomon’s Jar. The fabled Jar, which Solomon used to imprison the demons that allegedly created his temple.

Intrigued, Annja begins a journey, around the Middle East to discover the truth about the Jar. Her journey brings her to the attention of a few other groups also seeking the jar and who will kill anyone who gets in their way. On top of that, there is evidence that the demons really do exist.

Personal Thoughts – this instalment has Annja travelling around Europe and the Middle East seeking Solomon’s Jar. Her investigation has various other parties, both religious and political, trying to kill her and each other, as they too desire the Jar and its fabled powers.

During her investigations she meets an English archaeologist, Pasco, and through strange coincidences the pair work together to discover the Jar and stay ahead of the other violent parties.

I found the political aspects of this book very distracting and did spoil the overall affect of the story. There is, also, a lot more violence in this instalment. In some ways this takes away from the mystery of Annja’s quest. I felt the action scenes were too plentiful and not enough character interaction included. This was disappointing, as I found Annja’s character quite interesting in the first book. The most enjoyable parts of the book were the interactions between Annja and Pasco when they met at various times throughout the story, as it gave the reader a more personal insight into the reasoning behind why so many would desire Solomon’s Jar. And delves into their own personal struggle with the idea of power and the influences of demons.

Roux, is mentioned briefly in this instalment, which I felt was a shame. There is great scope for the old warrior, after all he is 500 years old, and the story did seem less interesting with his absence.
Despite everything, I still quite enjoyed this instalment, though not as good as the first book, I still hold out hope for the next instalment in the series.

Yes I know let us just get it out of the way. This is a vanity press/print on demand whatever you want to call it type of book. Also let us note, this is a children's book and that seven up there is based against other childrens books. Phew now those disclaimers are out of the way we can get down to business. So I suggest glancing over at the very least the following link about Hodag which you can find Here about Hodag Wow and you said this was a children's book? WTF no way, there are crazed devil beasts on that link. Well read a little further down where you can read it is a hoax (or is it?). This is where we can then flip it and take this into the minds of children as a tale of fun.

It is a nice little story of Happy the Hodag and Buddy the Bulldog in standard children rhyming style. I always find that enjoyable...give me a nice cadence for a childrens book and I dont mind reading it. The illustration style is very South Park meets Davy and Golith. Decent stuff I enjoyed the pictures as well I should in relation to the story. The author/illustrator does a nice job and creates little jokes in the background pictures which are perfect for the kiddies. Bigfoot yelling ah-boogada boogady boo! chasing the man with the rubber legs is just good stuff. The price of the book is a little high but I think this is because it is POD. Someone at a big company should snatch Jill up to write some more children's books. She is at least on par if not better then a ton of the stuff I see at the bookstore in the childrens section.

I will sum it up though by saying that people already familiar with the Hodag will have a more enjoyable experience reading this to their children. This should be selling like hotcakes in Northern Wisconsin. Sometimes you can find a decent POD book, but my guess is more often then not they are of the children's variety. You can read more at the author's website Happy and Buddy

A former military sniper, Reno, is hired to kill a thief. However, he has a secret, he’s the only living descendent of a family of shape shifters, and unbeknown to him his target is not only female, but also a shape shifter.

Personal Thoughts – we are introduced to Reno whilst he’s in jail, for attempted murder of a fellow officer, who raped and murdered his wife. He’s given the chance to leave prison, as long as he kills a thief, one that fights for her people. However, once he meets the freedom fighter, come thief, he falls for her charms and also learns she’s a shape shifter, a Jaguar, like himself. If he allows her to live and helps her cause, he will face a lifetime of being hunted by the law. But if he kills her, he will loose what could be the love of his life.

This is the premise for this story. Two shape shifters, find each other, under dire circumstances. They are drawn to their similarities and have to cope with their individual pain to forge a relationship that is supposed to be the deepest they will ever know, as its rare for two jaguar shape shifters to meet. The history of the Apache and the ideas behind the group, Warrior of the Light, is quite interesting. I would of liked more of the shape shifter theme in the story, but its not fully utilised at all in the plot. As with most romances, this story is focuses on what he feels, and what she feels, and how they feel about it each etc. Not, I feel, the most interesting storyline. And no characters are ever that perfect, the woman is strong, warrior like, yet vulnerable. The man is strong, protective, yet loving and attentive. Hence I didn’t find the character very realistic either.

Rivinaig has returned to earth, after spending years on an alien planet. Abducted as a youngster, with many other earth children, and now she has to adapt to living back on earth.

Personal Thoughts – The story starts with the Alien’s who adopted the earth children when a different race, the Aruk abducted them from their homes. Then the Aruk launch an attack on this colony and the children have to flee back to earth. This journey is seen through the eldest child, Rivinaig, as the story chronicles her experiences on earth.
I was confused, somewhat, as to which age group this book was written. The main character and her friend are mid teens, however the book is written in a simplistic style for younger readers to follow. Yet, some of the aspects of the story would be difficult for very young readers to understand.
The story also has very little focus and very little real depth of feeling. I found myself bored with the story and with the characters. The scenarios were not very realistic either.
Things came too easy for the main character, Rivi. Even when she was supposed to be in danger by the Aruk, I never felt there was any real threat.
It did have one redeeming quality, the story is short.

Julia Pomeroy’s debut, THE DARK END OF TOWN, offers a clear-eyed look at people and their relationships, their tragic entanglements and amazing resilience. Abby Silvernale has only a brief and discouraging modeling career in New York City before meeting her student-husband who moves them back to their mutual hometown. Bantam, New York boasts a collection of townies and tourists and Manhattan ex-pats, plus views of the nearby blue Catskills on one side and the Berkshires on the other. After struggling to create an upstate haven for young filmmakers and artists, Abby’s husband suddenly dies, abandoning his 30 year-old widow. Conflicted by grief and guilt, Abby rents out her husband’s inherited land and farmhouse to another couple while living in a used trailer on the property and waiting tables at the InnBetween, Bantam’s most popular fine restaurant among locals and transplants alike.

To fill her hours and pay off the trailer’s septic field, Abby works as a typist for a rich, bombastic screenwriter who’s at his alternate home in Hollywood and as a caterer for the well-heeled and well-connected still in town. Like her main workplace, Abby’s in-between, too, almost ready to step into a fuller life, not simply working until she drops into a lonely sleep broken by sad dreams. Perhaps that’s why she accepts the pre-dawn call from her boss, Dulcie, who wants her to stake out a cul-de-sac and figure out who’s been “borrowing” a minivan. While the initial problem may seem mundane, Abby will be led onward into the deepening mysteries of a young woman’s disappearance and a teenager accused of murder.

The strength of this book is Pomeroy’s deftness with the real-world scale of tensions within her characters and their interplay with the community. She creates an accurate portrayal of the arduous lifestyle of restaurant workers, something millions of us know first-hand, but rarely read with authenticity among the many amateur sleuths who always seem to get someone to cover their shifts, don’t regularly get footsore, and who never seem to be bleaching surfaces and dumping ice until 2:00a.m. Amid the back-breaking labor, difficult customers, and everyday catastrophes, Pomeroy shows how a popular restaurant (with a bar full of social lubricant) also becomes a community hub, a place where gossip is made and exchanged and where strong relationships develop between staff and patrons. She illustrates the ambivalence toward the cyclically invasive tourists felt by the local workers and business owners that need them, as well as between the community’s wealthiest and those that become their permanent service employees. The protagonist herself is believably drawn, not extremely wise-cracking, gloomily self-absorbed, or unnaturally prescient. Her grief and the way she daily pushes it aside to get on with the business of living feel real, and Pomeroy’s writing is fittingly clean and direct.

As a reader, the toughest going for me was early on, where the rationale for Abby’s involvement in, and her boss’s irritating detachment from, the late-night van-napping seems a little contrived. However, despite any brief weaknesses in plot motivation, the characters and situations ring true, with more balance and humanity than most small-town mysteries you’re likely to find. The solution is legitimate and satisfying, though this novel isn’t for those who love clockwork puzzles above the human ones. May Abby Silvernale’s ongoing adventures continue to prove that soft-boiled crime novels don’t need to be overwrought, insipid, or unrealistic, but can instead provide richer, more complex glimpses of interesting, recognizable places inhabited by flesh-and-blood people.

On the Isle of Revere, a great stone army of Shadow Warriors are unearthed. The Dragon Queen, Yavie needs to find the Wreken Wyrm Shard’s, to prevent them being used to wake the Shadow Warriors. She turns to her estranged daughter, Cwen and her companions to take up the quest.

Personal Thoughts - This book is the first in a series, that introduces the main characters in battle against dark sorcerers that would awaken the Shadow Warriors. Cwen, the daughter of the Dragon Queen, is quite an interesting character. She travels with her friend, Talin and reluctantly by another Caen, a thief who coverts her affections.
Despite her anger at the Guardians and her father, she takes on the quest to find the Shard’s and the three companions travel the lands, facing various foes and fighting many battles.
There were some interesting idea here and I enjoyed the interaction between the trio as they moved from one dangerous situation to the next in search of the Shards.
When I read some of the reviews printed inside the book, I was hoping for sharp, well crafted writing and an engrossing story.
However, I was disappointed in the general structure and flow of the storyline. The plot would skip from one scene to another, too quickly at times, which made the story a little shallow. The writing style was a little awkward at times and often I felt, wordy, taking away from the action scenes.
Some good ideas, with interesting characters, but would benefit from more stringent editing.