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(Thankfully) Not For "Second Screen" Readers. This is one of those books with a lot of moving parts, a lot of understatement... and a lot of terror, just below the surface. If you're not actively engaged with this text, you're going to miss quite a bit of what is

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Myopic At Best Polemic. This is a book that starts with a personal preference premise - that cars are evil and parking is ruining urban cores - and proceeds to write a 200+ page book covering what could more rightly be a flyer.

It raises some interesting points here and there, enough

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Fun Mystery/ Romance Blend. This is a book that could take a bit of an adventurous reader, but for those readers who do enjoy it... you're *really* going to enjoy it. Yet again we have a roma

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It Has Been A While Since I've Seen Someone Actively Praise Luddites. Until Now. Seriously, the title of this review pretty well sums up most of what you need to know about this book... that you could likely have figured out the gist of just from the title, subtitle, and description - at least as they exist roughly a month or so before publication, as I write this review.

Even from a - wildly - "left of cente

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Solid Introduction To Cultural Studies Marred By Dearth Of Bibliography. If you think that something "has" to be some way because of "biology"... Martens here is most lik [Continue Reading]

Academic (ie, Extremist Leftist) Slant Mars Needed Revelations. This is one of those books that with a more balanced approach could have been a clarion call about an issue that few (particularly those "in power" or among the more general, non-incarcerated, population) will ever really consider in depth or

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Fun Spin On Time Loop Concept. Time loops have been done by a lot of storytellers in a lot of ways, but here Harbison presents a version of one I'd never seen before - a women's fiction tale set on the weekend of a funeral

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Misses The Mark. This is a book that should have been completely objective. It should have been completely neutral on all things politics. It would have been an easy five stars and utterly useful for everyone had it been.

Instead, Hazrat chooses to infuse her personal politics into the story in sever

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July 2026 opened with elation and ended with devastation for me. Along the way, I did in fact manage to read 14 books... and cross the 100 books on the year mark.

Starting out the month at Walt Disney World for the America 250 celebrations was a trip. Both Magic Kingdom and Epcot really showed out, and I had a great viewing spot for each. Epcot in particular had easily the loudest sustained firework blast I've ever heard for its finale, and getting back to Pop Century after via the Skyliner took almost the same amount of time as it took me to actually drive all the way home to Jax from the park the next day.

Shortly thereafter, I announced I was (largely) pulling out of social media, and now that some of the bigger reasons I was hanging around are over, I'll be pulling back even more.

And then the end of the month. On the last weekend of the month, my cat got very sick... and never really recovered. By Wenesday, July 29, it was becoming obvious that we needed a vet's opinion, and we scheduled the appointment for Friday, July 31. Even getting into the exam room, I knew it was time when this cat, who absolutely HATED everything to do with the vet and would routinely bolt at the first available opportunity every prior time we had ever taken him... didn't. He wasn't pleased, and he let that be known via hissing and growling (as usual), but when he didn't even attempt to leave his carrier... I knew. The doc confirmed it a few minutes later, and at 5:45p on July 31, with my wife and I both petting him, Bucky died. Even 8 days later, that is still hard to write. And that is why this update has been delayed for a week, even as I have been reading and in fact have a few reviews to write tomorrow.

And now, on to the book reviews...

The Book Reviews

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Gatekeepers are a useful tool in fiction. They provide conflict and often offer the protagonist alternative ways to figure out how to reach their goals. I think about Ghostbusters when I think about Gatekeepers unless I’m thinking about that cool roller coaster at the Cedar Point gates.

In real life, though, gatekeepers are often self-proclaimed people who have decided that the rest of the world must follow their own moral code that they’ve developed from their own personal life experiences and interpretation of social and political events around them.

Oh, how I tire of the horror writer community and the gatekeeping that goes on. Perhaps things were better before we all got online, when we didn’t really know each other and our personal beliefs or our lives or our habits. We knew nothing of each other, and maybe that was a good way to be.

As someone who grew up typing novels on a manual typewriter, I’ve seen a lot of changes in the world. I was super resistant to personal computers; I thought we’d all get radiation poisoning and die, so I didn’t have a computer until 1987 when my husband bought me one to help me with my writing. I was very late getting a cell phone; I didn’t get one until 2008, because I don’t answer the phone anyw

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