Tag: amreading

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#BookReview: Mailman by Stephen Starring Grant

Inverted Hillbilly Elegy. That really is the easiest way to have a general idea about this book. Take nearly everything about Hillbilly Elegy, invert it, and you have a pretty solid approximation of Grant’s thinking. Told as a native of the eastern/ southern side of Appalachia rather than the western/ northern side, this is a man who went to prestigious Southern schools (his dad was shot in the 2007 Virginia Tech shooting) rather than prestigious Northern schools (“the” Ohio State and Yale). Instead of going into the military as a way out of Appalachia, Grant had already left Appalachia long ago as a businessman and came back during COVID to work in a purely peaceful, yet also Constitutionally guaranteed, service – the United States Postal Service, with its own sworn oath remarkably similar to that of the military’s. Instead of “spreading Democracy” as a desk jockey PR flack in Baghdad, Grant was the first person outside their homes and families that many people in his rural area of Virginia saw during the global shutdowns of COVID, spreading hope person to person in a manner somewhat reminiscent of the titular Postman of both David Brin’s original book and Kevin Costner’s movie (neither of which Grant ever mentions, to be clear). Instead of learning to fire a rifle from ROTC, Grant learned from his family and friends – including his avid fly fisherman dad. Instead of never really needing one in the safe zones of Baghdad (as Vance himself noted, to be clear), Grant speaks of the necessity of his John Browning designed 1911 pistol in the hinterlands of Appalachia – even against explicit USPS policy, as Grant notes more than once. Instead of the dangers of a broken family, Grant’s dangers come from both his own mind and the natural world around him, including an incident with a hornet nest as well as the burning and freezing of working out of a largely uninsulated metal box.

Now, Grant doesn’t seem to have any ambition for public office – even when Hillbilly Elegy came out, Vance was already running for US Senate – and that is truly one key distinction here. And yet, there are so many other similarities that the dichotomies really do speak to how you, the reader of my review of this book, can begin to get an idea of the overall nature of the book and whether you might be interested in reading it.

In all honesty, this is absolutely one I would recommend for anyone even remotely interested in learning about the lives of a “normal” (if any of us really are) American in a job most of us will never have, but who came to that job during a period where most all of us experienced massive upheaval. (To be clear, I was atypical during that period – the *only* difference in my job was that suddenly I was doing it from my home rather than driving across town to a cubicle I largely hated being in anyway. At the time I was working for a Fortune 50 global bank, and had been for a couple of years already. I wouldn’t leave there until long after the world had regained most normality, such as it had by the mid 2020s at least.)

Now, you may be asking me, “Jeff, why didn’t you deduct a star for relying on COVID so much? You literally did that in your very last review for a book set in that exact same year.” Which is a fair question, because I did do that and I do maintain that I largely don’t want to read anything about that year at all. But it is also a *nonfiction* and specifically *memoir* based look at that year (which also spared it the star deduction for lack of bibliography, as this was purely memoir), and it was clear from the description – that mentions Grant losing his job in March 2020 specifically and becoming a mail carrier after that point – that this book would be covering that period in some manner. Thus, I can’t exactly deduct a star for a real life look at that period that I was explicitly told up front was exactly that.

Overall a truly solid work perhaps more in the vein of the relatively unknown One Bullet Away by Nathaniel Frick (which told of a Dartmouth graduate’s experience as a Marine officer who was among the first “boots on the ground” in both Afghanistan and Iraq in the post 9/11 era) than Hillbilly Elegy, yet also with the direct contrasts between itself and Hillbilly. In other words, compelling, interesting, and…

Very Much Recommended.

This review of Mailman by Steven Starring Grant was originally written on July 14, 2025.

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#BookReview: The Blue Horse by Bruce Borgos

Rich And Multilayered Story Marred By Emphasis On COVID. At one point during/ after the world collapse due to COVID-19, I had an ironclad star deduction policy for any mention of COVID whatsoever. One line referencing it even obliquely was usually enough to trigger it. I’ve relaxed that policy over the years and no longer apply it for such one off/ tangential references, so long as they are minimal and don’t actually impact the story beyond an attempt to acknowledge the reality of setting any story in that period of world history.

This noted, I absolutely still apply it religiously when a story makes COVID a primary focus of the story… and unfortunately that happens here. Borgos could have used almost literally anything else to achieve some of the same ends he uses COVID for here, and it would have worked reasonably well – hell, some of them could have even tied into themes from earlier in the series. But he chose to use COVID, and that is damnable to many – and a major issue for me. Enough to warrant the star deduction, at minimum.

One of the other major themes here is perhaps just as volatile, if more locally – that of Nevada’s wild horses and what should be done about them. This story plays out across the entire book, and Borgos seemingly does a solid job of showing the strengths and weaknesses of both sides. I say “seemingly” here as as a native of the borderlands between Appalachia and Atlanta, I can certainly count on both hands the number of times I’ve even been west of the Mississippi River – and I’m pretty sure I can count them on one hand. I’ve only been west of Texas *once* – a weekend nearly 20 yrs ago in Phoenix, Arizona. Thus, I don’t really know anything at all about how Nevadans feel about this issue one way or the other, and unlike Borgos, this isn’t something I’ve spent a lifetime in and around- culturally, at minimum. (Now, if the issue is the American Civil War… different story. But that particular topic doesn’t apply to this book. :D)

Outside of these issues (and even inside of them, to a degree), this is a police procedural in form and format, if a more interesting/ less typical version of the sub genre in its particulars. Throughout this series, Borgos has made a truly interesting and compelling character in Porter Beck, a fully fleshed out, heroic yet flawed in his own ways, man of his world. Supporting characters, including Beck’s dad and sister, are equally compelling, and even other relationships come across as all too realistic, particularly as things develop further in this book with these relationships. Even secondary characters such as the various suspects of this book are fleshed out much better than other authors generally do, including some rather horrific backstories that have enough detail to them that they seem based on at least generalizations of specific real world people and events. Indeed, once one gets beyond the COVID and beyond the horse issue- both central to this particular story, to be clear – and perhaps beyond the issues of foreign ownership and mining also discussed here, though less prominently and in far less detail, the actual story here between the various characters themselves is actually quite strong, and everyone plays their roles rather superbly.

Borgos has done an excellent job of building this world in a realistic, complex manner that reflects on the real world issues of its place and time in a manner that provides food for thought for all involved and for those completely unfamiliar with the area or its issues, and in so doing presents a solid story for all readers, but particularly male readers who may be looking for more male-oriented books that don’t have the problems that more extreme forms of entertainment and/ or discussion all too often have.

Very much recommended.

This review of The Blue Horse by Bruce Borgos was originally written on July 13, 2025.

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#BookReview: Sunburned by Katherine Wood

Sun Drenched Suspense. From South Florida to a luxury island near St Maarten (itself, I can personally testify, an extravagance that needs to be experienced), this is one of those books that will transport you to its location quite well… but is it a Hotel California situation? 😉

Featuring a female IT specialist as our lead – not an overly common occurrence, even with literal decades of focus in specifically trying to recruit exactly this demographic into both college Computer Science programs and professional level jobs (even long before anyone had ever heard the acronym “DEI”) – this is a book that blends different forms of exotic with all-too-common petty jealousies and rivalries into a mashup that looks fresh and yet is also as old as time – well older, if you’re a computer geek and know well “when time began”. 😉

The overall story here is well done, but in a dual timeline model that many will enjoy but some will not. This one isn’t going to move the needle either direction for most readers as far as the dual timeline concept goes, but it *is* executed solidly here, with clear jumps and with the earlier timeline having clear and direct impact on the current timeline.

Overall a well done tale that fans of Woods’ previous book (as Woods), Ladykiller – one of my BookAnon.com Top 24 Books of 2024 – will enjoy, and fans new to this form of Woods’ writing will get a solid view of how she now approaches stories and storytelling. I was excited to see where Woods would go coming out of Ladykiller, and I’m excited to see where she will go next after this book as well.

Very much recommended.

This review of Sunburned by Katherine Wood was originally written on July 13, 2025.

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#BookReview: Falling For You Again by Kerry Lonsdale

Lonsdale At Her Absolute Best. Gah. These past couple of weeks. So very much going on. My wife had a widowmaker type heart attack, survived while having 2 stents placed in arteries 90 and 100% blocked, and is having a stent placed in her 80% blocked widowmaker artery later this week. Lonsdale herself suffering an unimaginable personal tragedy that is unfortunately all too common – even one of my own aunts has suffered it, and then we get to the dozens of people – including kids – dead in the Texas flash floods less than a week after Lonsdale’s tragedy. Bill Goldberg is facing his retirement match in Atlanta this weekend, and his own father died a week before that match. All the neverending political bullshit. Even I’m facing direct challenges in my own life that in some cases even my wife isn’t as fully aware of just how much they’re weighing on me as maybe she should be, things that few beyond family would even care about – if even them – and which I doubt I’ll ever publicly discuss.

And then we get to this book.

Escapism at its absolute finest, but with so many layers so expertly and intricately crafted that it pulls at the heart just enough for catharsis without delving into pain. That exquisitely powerful balance that the singular best description I’ve ever found of it (so far?) was the moment in XMen: First Class where Charles is teaching Erik to harness his full power and move the (60s era giant) satellite dish some distance away. Lonsdale, in this second chance romance book with various things that will irk various readers, manages to capture that feeling so well without ever even acknowledging it.

This is a romance for the real person. The flawed person. The one with flawed parents. Even the one without parents any longer. The one who just wants to do their job, do it well, and go home to be with their cat and their friends. (Sorry, dog lovers. This is a cat book. Read it anyway.)

If you need your romance books characters to be some idealized Superman or Wonder Woman, well, this book isn’t really for you – but you should still read it anyway, because it will pull at even your hardened heart strings.

If you need ghost pepper level spice in your romance books, again, this book isn’t really for you – but read it anyway and discover how there is so much more to love than just the physical.

If you need your books to have some kind of political messaging, again, not the book for you. Read it anyway and discover the power of *real* relationships, where love and community hold sway over the raw desire for domination and subjugation.

Read this book because as excellent as Lonsdale’s books have been over the years, whether it be the early “Everything” trilogy of romances or the more recent women’s fiction books of the “No More” trilogy and Find Me In California, this really is Lonsdale at her absolute best yet.

And I am 100% honest in saying that of the 90 books I’ve read this year upon finishing this one, this is absolutely in contention for best of the year, certainly for best of the year so far.

Very much recommended.

This review of Falling For You Again by Kerry Lonsdale was originally written on July 8, 2025.

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#BookReview: Artifact by Jeremy Robinson

The New God Of Science Fiction Directly Challenges Crichton – And Wins. Michael Crichton was, without a shadow of a doubt, one of the best and most influential science fiction writers since the era of Phillip K Dick and Isaac Asimov, if not H.G. Wells and Jules Verne. While he may have (arguably) had a dud here or there, many of his works have gone on to become absolutely iconic, including perhaps most famously, Jurassic Park. Indeed, it was because I was a big fan of Crichton’s Timeline – don’t bother with the movie there, or at least go into the movie not expecting it to adhere to the book, which is far superior – that I originally picked up Robinson’s Didymus Contingency, which had a similar back and forth time travel dynamic, though to a different period and location.

Here, Robinson takes at least one of the threats Crichton directly addressed – artificial intelligence and its ability to create life (though to be clear, the exact mechanism differs between Crichton and Robinson, in part based on two decades of technological difference when they wrote the books in question) – and to this fan of both books and authors… y’all, I daresay Robinson outdid even Crichton.

I know well that this is a bold claim, perhaps the boldest even I’ve ever made about a Robinson book – and let’s face it, I’ve been known to hype Robinson’s books perhaps higher than nearly anyone. But seriously? Better than Crichton, *head to head*?

I honestly think they are. And I read Prey when it first came out all those years ago. I liked it. Crichton did an excellent job with that tale, one of his better books since Jurassic Park.

I still think Robinson did it even better here.

Where Robinson *didn’t* hit as hard here is actually another author, a women’s fiction author who happened to use this exact same town as the setting for her book a few years ago – Melissa Payne‘s Memories In The Drift. If you’re more in for an absolute emotional gut punch that will leave you weeping on the floor, go with Payne’s book. If you’re more in for some scifi action that will possibly make you think a bit (or not, if you don’t want to), still leave you breathless, and still carry a bit of emotional heft to it… Robinson is where to go. Or really, read both and see how each author uses the same setting to tell wildly different tales – which to me is always fun. 🙂

One final point here before the summary: In this particular book, Robinson has one character in particular have a particular trait – and I’m being somewhat vague about it intentionally, as it is a spoiler since it isn’t revealed in the description of the book, even as I write this review just a few weeks before publication. (I actually read the book a few months ago and forgot to write a review until now! Eeek!) Weeks before publication of this book – a couple of weeks or so before I wrote this review on July 6, 2025 – Robinson wrote a blog post on his website BewareOfMonsters.com titled “What’s Up With My Brain” that actually reveals something about himself that plays directly into making this character as real as it really is. As someone with the same trait… Robinson did a truly phenomenal job with it in this book, and I *should* have picked up on why, knowing both him and this trait as well as I do.

Ultimately yet again one of Robinson’s stronger tales in all that it does – strong enough to take on a globally recognized master of the field and win, at least to my own preferences.

Very much recommended.

This review of Artifact by Jeremy Robinson was originally written on July 6, 2025.

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#BookReview: 30Seven by Jeremy Robinson

Rare (Possibly Unique?) Genre Bender/ Blender From The New God Of Science Fiction.

Every damn time I say “this is Jeremy Robinson at his absolute best”, he comes out with another book even better – usually with the very next book. 😀

Here, we get the kick ass scifi action Robinson gained his following for – he’s never going to go far from that, in my experience having read every book he’s written. But we *also* get an emotional depth that is sometimes less prevalent in his tales, and here we get it to the levels of his most emotional books to date such as The Distance or Alter. Indeed, it even harkens back all the way to The Last Hunter in some ways, with being even more blatant about just how much a father loves his son.

But then… the genre bending. Some of it, I’m not going to even hint at here, as it would be a massive spoiler. But I *can* say, given that Robinson has used this particular blend at other times (notably in the “Infinite Timeline”‘s The Dark), that the horror here is some of the darkest, sickest, most vile horror I’ve seen on page in quite some time – the kind of horror that makes you question even friends you’ve known online for approaching two decades and have even shared a few meals with in real life over the years. The other bit of genre bending though… you’re going to have to read this book. It was done at least as well as anything else here, but you’ll get no hints from me as to what it is. I will say that as good as the scifi/ horror itself is, this particular addition makes the story here *that much stronger*, and even though Robinson has never gone this direction before, he actually manages to pull it off at least as well as others who write in this space for their careers. Maybe even better.

As with so many of his books of late, there is also a fair amount of meta-commentary here, including one bit where even I had to tell him “You’re starting to convince me that you actually enjoy the frequent political complaints from both sides thinking they know you. “. So before you even get to that line in particular (and no I’m not revealing it), just know that *I* have known this man for nearly 20 yrs. We met in *Myspace*. I’ve read every book he has written, and I’ve even hung out with him at the annual (since 2015 or so) Robinsonfest event a few times, including both 2023 and 2024 when it was in St. Augustine, FL, near my home in Jacksonville. And even *I* can’t tell you his actual positions on any political or religious point. So if you think you know him better than I do… a few people do. His family. His long time editor. Several close friends, including several fans. Outside of those specific people… no, you most likely do not. Still, I invite you to read this book and write your own review of it, and if you feel you must call him out for some perceived political or religious sin… so be it. Just know that I for one am going to laugh my ass off when I see you do it. 🙂

Overall, this really was Robinson at his absolute best to date, pushing himself in directions I honestly never saw coming from him. Thus, almost no matter what your particular reading preference is… you need to put this one on your TBR. You’re going to want to experience this tale from a true Master of his craft.

Very much recommended.

This review of 30Seven by Jeremy Robinson was originally written on July 6, 2025.

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#BookReview: The Road That Made America by James Dodson

Phenomenal Esoteric Tale of American History You’ve Likely Never Heard Of Marred By Dearth Of Bibliography.

Looking back on my own ancestry off and on over the years, I’ve traced at least some lines to within a generation or two of when Europeans were in the Americas at all, and most of those lines come from somewhere in the British Isles – mostly England and Ireland (indeed, 5 of 6 historic Counties of Ireland), with a few Rhineland region relatives tossed in at different points for good measure. The ones that I’ve traced that far, they generally showed up in the Americas in Virginia or so and ultimately worked their way along the eastern side of the Appalachian foothills until they reached its southern end in the northwest corner of Georgia, not far from the border with North Carolina and Tennessee in the region known as the Great Smoky Mountains. There, I can trace nearly every line of my family tree to that same region for the past 180 years or so – including one multiple-great grandfather who died fighting for the Union in a battle in northeastern Alabama during the Civil War.

As it turns out, there was a reason my family took the geographic path it did once it got to the region now known as the United States – apparently quite a few immigrants made their way mostly down one particular road that wound its way along this very region from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania all the way to Augusta, Georgia – where even I spent a few years living directly across the river in Aiken, South Carolina.

But what do you care about all of this?

Well… long before the Oregon Trail or the Trail of Tears or other famous trails that took Americans west from the Appalachian Mountains ultimately to the Pacific Ocean, there was the Old Wagon Road. The road that fueled expansion inland *to* the Appalachians, and along which quite a bit of American history took place from the colonial years right up through the Civil War years in particular. This book reveals a lot of that history in stories not as well known by many, even when some of them involve names known by most Americans. Names like Benjamin Franklin and Robert E. Lee and Woodrow Wilson, just to name a few you’ll hear about in this text and recognize.

The real magic here though is in the names you *don’t* recognize. The tales you’ve *never* heard of before. This is where the “real” history of America lies – the history that is rapidly being forgotten and overwritten. The so-called “esoteric” history that supposedly only matters to fanatics and those whose ancestors directly played roles in or who were directly affected by, But one could argue – and Dodson makes a truly excellent case for throughout this book – that this is the very history that builds communities and tightens bonds within them. It is the history that binds people to place and whole to piece. It is the vagaries of one man choosing one path over another – and walking into the history books (for good or ill, at differing times) because of the path he chose that night. It is the history of families and communities coming together to celebrate the great times – and mourn the bad times. It is our history as Americans, and it is my personal history – even though Dodson’s tales here don’t touch on a single name I recognize from my family tree – because it is the history of how the nation came together via the individual and community actions of those who came so long before.

Narratively, this book is both memoir and history, following one man through time and space as he travels the road – as best as he can know it – from its origins in Philadelphia to its terminus in Augusta, learning the history of each place along the way and reflecting on his experience with it.

It is a stirring narrative, both in the communal and personal histories and in Dodson’s ability to craft his words in such an evocative way. And yes, there are sections where no matter your own personal politics, Dodson is likely going to say something you don’t overly like, whether it be espousing support for the so-called “1619 Project” in one chapter or supporting the right for Confederate monuments to exist in seemingly the very next chapter. But don’t defenestrate the book, no matter how tempting iq may be in the moment. Read Dodson’s words, and carefully consider them. This is no polemic. It is a pilgrimage, and one that we’re brought along for the ride on and asked to experience for ourselves via Dodson’s narrative here.

Overall a particularly strong book about histories largely forgotten and certainly far too often ignored. And yet it is this particular strength that also leads to its one flaw: For a book that shows so much history and even references quite a few texts along the way, for the bibliography to be only a page or two is damn near criminal. While the book did contain quite a few personal and direct interviews, there is also quite a bit of history discussed, and it would serve Dodson’s readers to have a more complete bibliography so that they could read up on the same sources he used in his own research.

Very much recommended.

This review of The Road That Made America by James Dodson was originally written on July 5, 2025.

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#BlogTour: Grave Birds by Dana Elmendorf

For this blog tour, we’re looking at another strong Southern Gothic tale that serves as an emerging author’s sophomore effort for adult readers. For this blog tour, we’re looking at Grave Birds by Dana Elmendorf.

First, the review I posted to the book sites (BookBub.com / BookHype.com / Goodreads.com / Hardcover.app / PageBound.co / TheStoryGraph.com) and YouTube:

Strong Southern Gothic Tale. Perfect for those who love to start “spooky season” on July 5th (with no other major (decorative, at least) holidays in the US before Halloween), yet also has a strong small town mystery and even a touch of romance, this is one book that checks a lot of boxes – yet manages to do them all quite well.

Even as a native of the South, specifically the borderlands between southern Appalachia and exurban Atlanta, I had never heard of the concept of a “grave bird”, yet Elemndorf both (quickly) explains it well… and then uses it particularly well throughout the novel whose title notes that it is all about these creatures. 😉

But seriously, the titular grave birds give this tale a magical realism/ fantasy tone that is exactly what one would expect in a Southern Gothic tale, but really the core of this book is one woman’s dreams and the depths she will go through to achieve them – even if it means unravelling a decades old town mystery so well hidden that virtually no one even actually knows there is a mystery to solve!

Truly a strong and stirring sophomore effort (for adult audiences, at least), this really is a strong tale told particularly well, and one that is both familiar enough to be understood and even relatable, yet innovative enough so that the reader will still be caught quite breathless at times.

Very much recommended.

After the jump, an excerpt from the book followed by the “publisher details” – book info, description, author bio, social links, and buy links.
Continue reading “#BlogTour: Grave Birds by Dana Elmendorf”

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#BlogTour: Reports Of His Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated by James Goodhand

For this blog tour, we’re looking at a hilarious and heartwarming absurdist British drama. For this blog tour, we’re looking at Reports Of His Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated by James Goodhand.

First, the review I posted to the book sites (BookBub.com / BookHype.com / Goodreads.com / Hardcover.app / PageBound.co / TheStoryGraph.com) and YouTube:

Hilarious (If In An Absurdist/ British Manner) And Heartwarming. I’m going to do this review in two parts, because there is a very key similarity between this book and a (possibly now somewhat obscure) movie that was at one time decently well known – but to reveal which movie is a *massive* spoiler.

So here’s the spoiler free part:

This book is going to make you laugh. It is going to make you cry. It is going to make you reach out to speak with and hold those closest to you, and it is going to make you think about your own life. And it is going to do all of that via allowing you to see through the eyes of a loner recluse that nobody gives a damn about who happens to be mistaken for a dead neighbor. Goodhand does another amazing job of telling a story in such a low key way, yet managing to hit exactly the notes he seems to have been going for. Truly an awesome story that will be a great counter weight to both the bubble gum pop or hyper macho action books you’re reading this summer as well as the extreme dark horror tales some (weirdos – joking, to be clear) look to this time of year or even the nonfiction books that a lot of ppl seek to read in the summer. And yes, guys, put down the nonfiction and read this book. It is absolutely for you, and you’re going to be able to have quite a bit of “teh feelz” in a safe space with this book. Ladies, don’t let the last sentence fool you, you’re going to enjoy this book at least as much as the guys, as there is quite a bit here for you too – just not quite as prominent, more in the sub story with some stuff that is going on throughout the book.

And now… the spoilers. DO NOT READ BELOW HERE IF YOU DO NOT WANT SPOILERS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Giving.
People.
Who.
Don’t.
Want.
To.
Be.
Spoiled.
Time.
To.
Leave.

Ok, at this point I’ve given everyone’s eyes a chance to leave before you read what I say next, so HERE COME THE SPOILERS.

Mr. Holland’s Opus has to be one of my favorite movies of all time. Its final scene in particular, where Mr. Holland comes to school ostensibly to pick up his last remaining boxes from his classroom after a lifetime of teaching at this school, only to hear some noise coming from somewhere… then following it to find an auditorium full of his former students and colleagues, all there to celebrate him… simply phenomenal.

If you love that movie, and particularly that scene, as much as I do… well, you’re already in the spoiler section of this review. Suffice it to say, without giving *everything* away, that there is a very similar scene here, and it is just as phenomenal as that one. *Maybe* even a touch better. I don’t *know* that Goodhand was aware of this scene, but it at least seems possible.

Now, my job as a reviewer is to both describe my experience with a book and, ultimately, to try to help sell it, even on books I absolutely detest. So particularly when a book was as excellent as this one, I need to talk about the things that I think could help it sell, and thus I *needed* to mention this movie. Plus, I couldn’t help but immediately think of that movie as the scene here was playing out, so I’m also being true to my own experience with the book in mentioning it. But I do know it is a massive spoiler, so it has been embedded in these spoiler tags.

And.
Now.
We.
Come.
Back.
Out.
Of.
The.
Spoilers.

Ultimately, this was truly an excellent book that I think most anyone will truly have a great time with, and in the lower half of the 300 page range, it isn’t a tome that will take weeks to read either, so it should be accessible to most readers.

Very much recommended.

After the jump, an excerpt from the book followed by the “publisher details” – book info, description, author bio, social links, and buy links.
Continue reading “#BlogTour: Reports Of His Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated by James Goodhand”

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#BookReview: Don’t Open Your Eyes by Liv Constantine

I Thought I Was The Only One. It is no secret that my book reviews are in part confessionals, that is my entire schtick as a reviewer and literally the basis of my brand name. So here’s one I don’t talk about often, but which those who have known me since I was a kid are aware of – it actually caused a bit of drama a couple of times back then: The dream sequences that happen in this book? The ones that our lead character feels are so vivid and real, that they really could be glimpses into the future?

I’ve lived with those same types of dreams off and on for over forty years now. And no, it isn’t deja vu. It is pretty well exactly as Constantine describes here – so real and visceral that you *know* you’ve lived those very events before.

Except unlike our lead character – or in some ways perhaps exactly like her – I learned early on, from a couple of blunders that caused the drama I referenced above, to not (obviously) act on the dreams, but instead to prepare myself for the outcomes they warned me of so that I could at least be prepared if or when they happened.

So for me in particular, that part of this book was *phenomenal*. It was easily relatable to one of those aspects of my life that I virtually *never* talk about anymore, because as our lead character in the book learns, people – even those closest to you – rapidly begin to think you’re crazy when you so openly talk about it. (Which is one reason I’m not going into any real details about my own experiences, and indeed I can actively state that these types of dreams don’t happen nearly as often anymore as they did when I was younger. My overall life is also *dramatically* different than it was, and I suspect this plays a role.)

But that aspect is only roughly half this tale, the setup. And while a phenomenal setup, it *is* a rather slow one. It takes time for those less accustomed to these types of dreams to wrap your head around what is going on with this character, and Constantine gives you that kind of time. She needs to, because the later stages, where the action picks up and indeed becomes rather breathtaking, *need* you to understand that part of this character and believe it as much as she does.

Thus, when the action picks up, the dreams become less a part of the active story and more a part of what is informing the action sequences as they play out. At this point, it becomes a far more typical thriller, one of the exact type Constantine is known for and excels at, and it shows brilliantly here.

Overall truly a great thriller that shows a side of life that most likely aren’t as familiar with, and does so in a way that rings true to at least my own experiences with similar experiences in real life.

Very much recommended.

This review of Don’t Open Your Eyes by Liv Constantine was originally written on June 30, 2025. (With apologies for the tardiness on this Advance Review Copy. Some major life events happened just before the release of this book that unfortunately delayed me reading it.)