Tag: NorthCarolina

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#BlogTour: Gone In The Storm by B.R. Spangler

For this blog tour, we’re looking at a murder mystery with one of the creepier killers I’ve read of late. For this blog tour, we’re looking at Gone In The Storm by B.R. Spangler.

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

Spangler Returns With One Of His Creepiest Killers Yet. Seriously, while Spangler has had some pretty creepy killers in this series in particular, this one is certainly near the top of that particular chart – and we see this from essentially the opening words of this text.

Maintaining the series cohesion, this tale is nearly as much about Detective Casey White’s personal and professional struggles as it is the “freak of the week” murder mystery, so even as White finds herself going up against one of her toughest investigations to date… she’s also encountering a lot of things that make her question a lot of things, and these ultimately could prove quite interesting indeed to the overall series – or even perhaps an ending at some point in the near-ish future?

For me, this particular tale, with its falsely accused high school student in particular, took a bit of a more personal tack, as I too ran into a somewhat similar situation at that age, so I know all too well what that feels like. In my personal case, while it wound up leading me to leave that school, it also wound up giving me everything I now have thanks to a very crucial several month period there between Fall 1998 and Summer 1999. I’ll simply note that I have – still, all these years later – a very nicely written apology letter from one of the leaders of those falsely accusing me back then and that because of all of that, I met my high school mentor, Tommy Harris, then of the now long defunct Bartow Academy in Cartersville, Georgia – and it was Mr. Harris who became so instrumental in helping shape truly the rest of my life. So while we don’t know how this situation affects the rest of this particular character’s life in the world Spangler has created here, I can state with confidence that such situations *can* wind up ultimately benefitting the falsely accused – even though the hell they go through in the short term can be quite immense, and Spangler does a great job of showing this.

Read this book because it really is an excellently written creepy murder mystery set, as always with this series, in North Carolina’s Outer Banks. And hey, maybe something in it will resonate with you too. Either way, make sure to leave a review once you’ve read it.

Very much recommended.

After the jump, the “publisher details” – book info, description, author bio, social links, and buy links.
Continue reading “#BlogTour: Gone In The Storm by B.R. Spangler”

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#BookReview: We Are Made Of Stars by Rochelle Weinstein

Surprising And Unexpected Yet Powerful. Following Weinstein on social media, I know she was writing this book shortly after the Hamas attacks on Israel in late 2023. As I finished reading this text (that I’ve had on my Kindle for a couple of months or so even now), Hamas had been parading the caskets of several babies they had murdered earlier in the day. Given that the Surfside Condo collapse in Miami a few years ago now – where Weinstein’s family personally knew a few of the victims – clearly contributed quite a bit of emotional heft to the book she was writing at the time, I expected the same to be true here, as Weinstein is quite vocal (yet, to be clear, not preachy) about her Jewish faith and support of the State of Israel. (Haters, go the fuck away. While I’ve only known Weinstein online to date, she is truly a great person in my own interactions with her, no matter what your own political beliefs may be – and we *do* disagree quite substantially politically.)

So that is the background I approached this story with, my own “baggage” I brought into the Drift, even as I generally approach each and every book with a blank slate – and indeed knew *nothing* about this book beyond its title and that Weinstein had written it when I agreed to read and review it, and even when reading it this remained all that I knew (plus that it releases next week so I needed to hurry up with the reading and reviewing!).

What I actually found here was, as I noted in the title of the review, quite surprising and unexpected – for some reason I expected at least one blatantly Jewish character, if not every single protagonist in the book, to be honest, along with a much more blatantly Jewish plot, along the lines of say Jean Meltzer’s books… even though I know from prior reading that this isn’t really Weinstein’s style. What I *actually* got here was a powerful tale of several flawed duos within families – mostly husbands and wives going trying to work through some level of trauma within their relationship, but also a powerful story (that takes a more prominent role later in the text) between a mother and her daughter.

While there are a total of ten main characters and the story *is* told from multiple perspectives (yes, I know there are readers who don’t like that either – if you’re at least willing to try it, this is a *really* good one to try with), Weinstein (and, perhaps, her editors) made the smart choice of limiting our number of perspectives to just a few, and never both halves of any of the five duos. This helps both story cohesion and progression, as even with chapter based perspective switches, at least this way we aren’t getting first person views of both sides of the dynamic in question.

And the traumas that are happening here… even without being explicitly tied into anything overly “real-world”, they’re at the same time all too real. I don’t want to detail them here due to spoiler potential, but I will note that Weinstein truly shines here in just how real and relatable she manages to make pretty well everything about all of these interweaving secrets and dynamics, and the pacing is done particularly well such that some surprises are tossed in early, others are late and seemingly out of nowhere (yet fit perfectly), and still others are teased well with what becomes for me at least a perfectly satisfactory payoff.

Overall truly a powerful and well written story, exactly what Weinstein is known for, and one that will have the room quite dusty at several different points – you’ve been warned about that too, now. 😉 This is one that will leave you with that beautiful “wow, what did I just read” feeling (in the best possible ways) and will hopefully show you a path through even your own struggles.

Very much recommended.

This review of We Are Made Of Stars by Rochelle Weinstein was originally written on February 21, 2025.

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#BookReview: Guilty Until Innocent by Robert Whitlow

More Southern Fiction Than Legal Thriller. Admittedly it has been several years since I last picked up a book by Whitlow, but back in the day this author was essentially a Christian form of John Grisham – he’s going to give you tight, exciting legal thrillers of some form (via inside or outside the courtroom itself), but a Christian version of it where people more openly pray and talk about “God stuff” and such.

This book… keeps all the “God stuff” *in spades* (seriously, if you’re openly hostile to anything Christian or even just not at all interested in anything Christian… don’t bother reading this book, you’re not going to like it) but ditches the legal thriller aspects in favor of a more Boo Walker or Nicholas Sparks or Pat Conroy ish Southern fiction tale.

The story is long, some might argue too long, drawn out, yet ultimately satisfying for what it actually is and the multiple sub plots it is running concurrently. There is a *touch* of action near the end, but it really is more of a “slight rise on a kiddie coaster” level than anything particularly suspenseful – more suspenseful than anything else in this tale, but that only serves to highlight just how little actual danger there seems to be at any point here.

Still a great tale for what it actually is, just in no way any form of thriller or suspense.

Very much recommended.

This review of Guilty Until Innocent by Robert Whitlow was originally written on January 16, 2025.

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#BlogTour: Our Sister’s Grave by B.R. Spangler

For this blog tour, we’re looking at the latest pulse pounding thriller in BR Spangler’s Detective Casey White series that introduces a new idea into the series for the first time. For this blog tour, we’re looking at Our Sister’s Grave by B.R. Spangler.

Here’s what I had to say on the review sites (Hardcover.app, TheStoryGraph, BookHype, Goodreads):

Pulse Pounding Thriller In And Out Of The Water. This is one of those coastal murder tales where there is actually quite a bit happening both in and out of the water – and our team is right in the thick of all of it, after a diver dies underwater. With this tenth entry into the series – written loosely enough that if one doesn’t mind spoilers about the team’s relationships, nothing about (most) of the prior mysteries is spoiled here, meaning it is mostly ok for new fans to start here and work their way back, should they so choose – Spangler actually manages to incorporate a few things not seen in prior books in this series, including a few particular cultural touchstones that it is genuinely surprising that it took him this long to use, given the region he has chosen to set this particular series. And man, when he *does* incorporate them… he almost makes me want to drive up I-95 a few hrs and get to the Outer Banks this weekend myself. Even though I am in no way, shape, or form a diver of any sense involving diving underwater. 😀

Overall another solid entry in this series, one where yet again the stakes are raised in so very many ways. Very much recommended.

After the jump, an excerpt from the book followed by the “publisher details” – book description, author bio, and social media and buy links.
Continue reading “#BlogTour: Our Sister’s Grave by B.R. Spangler”

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#BookReview: The Haven by Nicola Marsh

Sold Short Sychological Sequel. (Yes, the alliteration didn’t work with “psychological”, so I had to misspell it. :D) This is one of those sequels where you actually really need to read its prior book, in this case The Retreat, first. But since both are actually perfect for when you want a spooky read (such as during Halloween, when this book releases)… that is actually a great thing in this case.

This one is perhaps a bit less gothic, though it certainly has the creepy old mansion. It also has an even deeper tangle of secrets, as characters from the first book come back to play roles in this book as well – though certainly not all of them, and even in nearly every horror tale out there, at least one person survives. So the prior bit isn’t really a spoiler of anything. 😀 But *does* point to *why* you need to read The Retreat first.

In both cases though, you get quite a bit of tale packed into relatively short (here, 260 ish pages) books – making them a bigger bang for your buck than longer, slower tales. And making them overall better for when life is busy and/ or you are doing other things, but also want to read some books.

And as explosive as the ending was in The Retreat… here, while the explosions are of a different type… they may be even bigger and more devastating…

Very much recommended.

This review of The Haven by Nicola Marsh was originally written on October 11, 2023.

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#BlogTour: Two Little Souls by B.R. Spangler

For this blog tour, we’re looking at an explosive tale that is an immediate sequel to the events of the book before it. For this blog tour, we’re looking at Two Little Souls by B.R. Spangler.

Here’s what I had to say on Goodreads:

Explosive Tale But Make Sure You Read Book 8, Their Resting Place, First. Without revealing any actual details, all I’m going to say here is that this book picks up immediately after the prior book in this series – and because of that, you really need to make it a point to read that book first.

Here, our team has several problems to work through – both professionally and personally. The case they find themselves involved in is even more time sensitive than most of their prior cases, and yet the team’s personal priorities are also in a state of flux. Spangler manages both sides of the police procedural format masterfully here, combining both to excellent effect to create quite possibly one of the best complete books of this series to date.

Overall truly a compelling tale that won’t quite leave you with that “I NEED THE NEXT BOOK RIGHT THIS SECOND” feeling from the prior book, but will still leave you satisfied and waiting anxiously for the next book to come out anyway, as you want to learn what happens next in the lives of our investigators. Very much recommended.

After the jump, the “publisher details”, including book description, author bio, and social media and buy links.
Continue reading “#BlogTour: Two Little Souls by B.R. Spangler”

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#BookReview: The Broken Hearts Club by Susan Bishop Crispell

Interesting Take On High School Love Angles. This book is quirky enough to make everything work, and yet has a lot of things about it that will throw various groups off – often having some element that may be popular with one group, yet having another element that will be off-putting to that same group. For example, you’ve got the aura-reading ability where our main character sees emotions as colors and you’ve got the nonbinary side character – and yet the book’s very premise is that our main character is openly catfishing, gets caught doing so, and yet things somehow still work out for her. You’ve got some good, hard work ethic going with both our main character and her best friend, and yet the best friend openly chooses the boy over her best friend. You’ve got the seemingly rural small town North Carolina vibe going on – and you’ve got the aforementioned nonbinary character that seems mostly tacked in just to have an excuse to go off on “small minded Republicans” and to be able to promote that the book has a queer character. It could be argued that doing this character in this manner isn’t inclusive, but exploitive – and off putting to at least some potential readers anyway. And yet, despite all of its contradictions and issues… the book truly does work. If you’re into young adult/ high school romance at all, this book is going to scratch most every itch you have there, and it does in fact have the interesting wrinkles of the auras and how to *use* that ability to set it apart from the field naturally, without needing all of the other aspects. In the end, despite coming close to seeming to try too hard, this really is a mostly benign and fairly interesting tale within its genre, and a very easy and mostly inoffensive summer/ beach read that won’t get the pulse pounding too much, but will instead be a more charming and breezy read while sitting poolside or oceanside soaking up some sun. Recommended.

PS: There is no such thing as a love triangle without at least two of the three people involved being bisexual. Thus, while some describe this book as featuring a love “triangle”, as all three involved are never described as bisexual, it is most accurately described as a love “angle”, with three points and two line segments, the segments meeting at a common point. But this could well be the former math teacher and Autistic in me coming out. I admittedly tend to be a bit pedantic on this particular point. 🙂

This review of The Broken Hearts Club by Susan Bishop Crispell was originally written on May 26, 2023.

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Featured New Release Of The Week: When We Let Go by Rochelle B Weinstein

This week we’re looking at a staggering tale of loss and recovery. This week we’re looking at When We Let Go by Rochelle B Weinstein.

Emotional Tale Of Loss And Recovery. This is one of those tales where you know up front that it is dark… and then it gets darker. And darker. And darker. With just enough humor to lighten things up a bit… and then a gut-punch of a form that may be used a bit often (as another reviewer claimed), but which works within the tale being told here. Similarly, as this is ultimately a tale of *recovery* from such devastation, one element of the epilogue that I’ve panned as unnecessary and even detracting from other books in other reviews actually works in this particular tale. And it works *specifically because* of the tale told up to that point. Truly an excellent work, and very much recommended.

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#BookReview: A Barefoot Tide by Grace Greene

Sometimes All It Takes Is A Break. This was a remarkable tale of a woman who was down on her luck being given a chance to take a break… who comes to realize all that she does have, and, perhaps, all that she needs to change. The book-within-a-book was a great technique that is sure to grab the attention of the literati types, but overall Lilliane’s story was a great crossover between Greene’s mountain based Cub Creek series and beach based Emerald Isle series, one full of heart and… well, grace. 😀 The ending left this particular reader hoping for at least one more book with these characters, though the two sentence description of that book is quite clear of where it needs to go. So y’all need to go buy this book and give Greene a reason to come back to these particular characters. 😀 Very much recommended.

This review of A Barefoot Tide by Grace Greene was originally written on January 11, 2021.