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Baking Bread Was Never So Much Fun!

Revisado: 12-29-21

Ah! This was so cute and creative. The author must have had a blast writing this because it shows.

It all starts when Mona discovers a dead body in their bakery. Mona is a wizard that works with bread. Yep, bread. That's it - just bread. And although this is considered minor magic, she still gets accused of the murder solely because she is a wizard. It doesn't take long before she learns there is a growing threat that magicas like her are facing in the city-state and while most magical individuals leave (or are killed), Mona soon finds herself in the unenviable position of having to stand-up and fight against the enemy.

And face the enemy she does - with bread! Who knew bread could have so many uses in battle? With a side-kick named Bob (yeast starter), a gingerbread man familiar, and a newfound belief and understanding of her talents she almost single-handedly helps win a war/battle. I don't think I've ever listened to so many chapters about battle and preparation for battle in a middle grade book as I did in this one. And it was all awesome.

The story is told through Mona's perspective, where she injects wit and humor into everything. But I also loved how she realized and discussed with herself that this should have been completely handled by the adults. It should never have come down to a kid like her having to be the one to make people aware of the dangers against the magicas or be forced to save the day. The adults should have been, well...the adults should have been the adults. They should have realized what was going on and put a stop to it.

The audio book was voice acted by Patricia Santomasso, who did not just a great job narrating, but also getting the humor down. Mona has many internal conversations and comments about things she is experiencing or witnessing. It's not always easy to do a 14-year old's comedic voice and she nailed it.

Highly recommend if you are looking for a light, fun read with a comedic touch. It's a middle grade story, but one that someone at any age could enjoy.

Rating 5 stars

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Another Great Addition to the Eerie-on-Sea Series

Revisado: 12-27-21

I'm not sure how Thomas Taylor does it, but these books just seem to get better and better. The Eerie-on-Sea series is just about perfection in how it has created a town full of unique, odd, and eccentric inhabitants and legends that come to life.

If you are not familiar with the series it features Herbie Lemon, the Lost-and-Founder at the Grand Nautilus Hotel, and his best friend Violet. Years ago Herbie washed up from a shipwreck in a crate of lemons having no memory of his past. But! That all potentially change in this latest book when someone comes to the Grand Nautilus and claims to be Herbie's aunt.

You might think Violet would be happy for Herbie, but she has her doubts about his "aunt." On the other hand, Herbie thinks Violet is just jealous that he found his family before she found hers. This disagreement creates tension between our two heroes resulting in one of the best fight scenes ever. These two are definitely not expert fighters and listening to it on audio book gave me quite a laugh.

But while the drama between Herbie/Violet is occurring, there is even more happening in the town itself. The Ghastly Nights are approaching (their fall event) and this year is looking to be even more 'ghastly' than normal. People go missing, odd behavior occurs for others, and in the end more mysterious things about the town are discovered leaving us with even more questions about what's to come.

Two side notes:
- Two of the best assistants/henchmen ever are featured in Shadowghast. The Mime assistants had me chuckling whenever they entered the scene as I could see their actions play out.
- If you have been wanting more of Erwin (the talking cat), then this is your book! He popped up everywhere you would expect and not expect him to be. I can't wait to see more of him in future books.

I had the pleasure of listening to this book on audio and once again Will M. Watt has brought the story to life. A terrific range of voices and inflections for each character. The perfect choice.

Rating: 5 stars

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Just a Lot of Fun

Revisado: 01-03-20

There is a classic approach to this space opera story and I loved the simplicity of it. The Odyssey has been designated as the first ship to use a transition drive system to allow faster-than-light travel. It’s mission was just to go to a predetermined area, scope it out a little, and come home. Except, when they transition to their predetermined star system they pick up a distress beacon and feel obligated to look into it, which in turn leads them to make first contact with a human from another planet (Priminae colonist) and eventually helping them fight to overcome spider-like ugly creatures who are intent on destroying all the Priminae colonies.

The book and story is just fun – it’s space opera and space battles. The heroes are obviously those of Earth and the Priminae colonies and the bad guys are the Drasin (the spider-like ugly creatures). It’s set up where you can easily understand everything including the overall approach to the plot and story as well as the battles and build-up to the battles, which is key in this type of story.

Audio Book Review

So, I started with the follow-on series, Archangel One, which uses a different voice actor than this series does, which is David de Vries. I was ok with the Archangel One narrator and had gotten used to his style and found myself having to adjust a little at first to this series narrator. But the adjustment didn’t take too long because I came to really enjoy this narrator. Every character has their own unique voice and different accent, which to me is very key for a good audio book performance. And I never had any issue identifying if it was Steph and his southern accent and relaxed manner of speaking or Milla and her Priminae accent, which sounds like a mix of different European accents.

But one thing was very apparent to me in the audio book – space battles and space fight scenes are a ton of fun to listen to when there are many different, unique characters to listen to. It was like being part of the action – a fly on the wall – as all of them go back and forth giving each other a hard time, or giving orders, or directing attention to specific issues at hand. They are all stressed due to the conflict and you can hear it in their voices, which kept me engaged and on the edge of my seat.

Overall, a great start to this series and look forward to picking up the next one.

Rating: 5 stars – mostly because the book was just a lot of fun.

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Excellent Start to Series/Speed was a Little Slow

Revisado: 12-30-19

Sometimes you find a book when you just need it most. I tend to really enjoy military science fiction stories, but oddly enough I don’t read them very often. Not sure why that is. I happened to run across this one when randomly searching for something new to read within science fiction. Kindle Unlimited offered this one in both written and audio format. I chose the audio version and it was a blast!
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This was so much fun to listen to. It’s actually the first in a new series, but the universe it exists in originates from the Odyssey One series. This is my first time to read anything by this author so everything in it was new to me.

As best I can tell, the premise is that at the end of the Odyssey One series there is a truce of sorts between Earth and their allies with the Imperialists. However, no one believes the Empire is just going to let things lie. So, with brand new fighter ships that no one has seen before, the Archangel squadron is given the task to go into deep space, pretend to be pirates and start gathering intelligence. What occurs is they find themselves assisting in a battle between two planets, but in the process they learn a lot more is going on from behind the scenes by the Empire.

Audio Book Review

I thoroughly enjoyed the drama and action this book presented over audio. Archangel One is full of action and military space fights and listening to this made everything come alive – from the story, to the characters and to the stress they are all under. If I had to choose between reading orders being given by a character or hearing orders being barked at to another character, I’ll choose the latter every time. I will never go to space or participate in a space opera, but listening to a space battle on audio has got to be the closest thing to it. So much drama and action!

The story also has a wide range of characters in the book, providing the narrator a lot of opportunities to shine with his many voices and accents.

Although, I loved the story and audio book, I did have two very minor issues when listening. First, the audio speed was rather slow. I’m not someone who usually increases the speed of an audio book, although I believe many do. However, the original speed was just a bit too slow for me to listen to, so I felt I needed to increase it in order to make it feel a little more natural sounding. Doing so also created another positive – action scenes come at you quicker and helped increase the intensity of the story. The other issue is more because it was a new series to me than anything else and that is how it was a little difficult at the beginning for me to distinguish where the different scenes take place. In the book, there is clearly a heading telling you where you are in the universe – Earth, Empire, etc. and it does get announced in the story, but somehow my ears had trouble picking this up at first. Thankfully, I did have the book to fall back on and could quickly look to in these situations.

Overall, I found the story to have a cohesive order to it, where circumstances don’t feel out of place or position within the context of the story. In general, I am not very knowledgeable in spaceships and the science of them, so I can’t comment too much on that part, but I found it was generally easy to pick up and understand. I’m already looking forward to the next book in the series when it comes out in January 2020.

Rating: 4.5 stars

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Science Sometimes Comes With Costs

Revisado: 10-29-19 El oyente recibió este título gratis

A science fiction story about a small group attempting to resist against a corporation that has enabled a scientific achievement to go off the rails and become militarized. However, first the main person who can help them needs to remember…everything.

Audio Book Review:
If there is anything that became crystal clear while listening to this audio book it was this: this narrator loves doing this job. The author has a way of writing dialogue and character internal thoughts so that it sounds very conversational or in such a manner as what an actual person might think or say. The narrator, Steve Castello, knows exactly how to make each phrase and internal conversation sound so incredibly natural. So natural that it seems as if the narrator himself is providing his own thoughts and commentary and not reading from the book.

At the beginning of the story our main character wakes up with several individuals around him, but has no clue who they are or who they are to him. What I found was that when I listened to this particular audio book in only a few, short minutes at a time that what occurred was that I would get a little lost in the story. The main character does know not anything or the other characters around him – therefore the listener doesn’t either. Then, you stop listening only to come back to it later but you (and he ) still don’t know anything and have no reference points – yet. For this reason, I would definitely recommend attempting to listen to the beginning of the story in longer segments than I did. At least, until you feel like you have a good foothold in the story. Once I realized this and found time to do it the story became more cohesive to me and I was able to enjoy it more since I wasn’t required to have to replay certain parts over again.

One of the initial things that has stood out to me since the first time I heard the narrator in The Swift was his deep voice. However, even with this deep voice he is able to give a higher-pitched and soft touch to the female characters and then on the other end of the spectrum he can apparently go even lower like he does with the character ‘D.’

If there are any negative things that stand out in the book it was the overuse of ‘baby’ by Kate and the ongoing acknowledgement of the Greek Goddess’s female anatomy parts that the main character liked. However, I suspect that the continual use of the term ‘baby’ probably reads better than how it came across in the audio book. As for the Greek Goddess, I know had to replay certain parts to get caught-up when I had been away from the book for too long and got double-the dose of the phrases that were annoying me in regards to her. But the narrators exuberance at times with the female body part didn’t sit well with me. At this point in time, I have finished the story and although the overuse of terms, such as Kate, make much more sense now, I still have issues with them.

Overall, the production quality of the audio book was ok – I was able to hear and understand the words when using either my headsets or when driving in the car. The story was engaging, but as I mentioned I did have some confusion at times in the beginning due to only being able to listen at small moments in time.

Rating: 4 stars

Thanks to the author for the reader copy and opportunity to provide an honest review.

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New Seth Walker Book is a Fun Action Read

Revisado: 10-19-19

This thriller is full of action sequences and characters that kept my interest through-out the entire book. Plus, I got to learn a lot about drones that I didn’t know before.

Thoughts:

False Horizons is a book full of action and perfect for those who enjoy tense moments. I’ll be honest, when I first started reading I only expected action toward the end and maybe a moment in the middle, but was pleasantly surprised when the action started fairly early on and continued through-out the entire book. Each action sequence was descriptive, well thought-out, and unique, but there are also moments in between the action where the characters regroup, rethink, and discuss what may be going on and what their next step may be providing a moment for your heart to stop beating so fast. However, all this action can also come at a cost and not every character is always safe.

The characters, both main and secondary, are well written. While the main character is Seth Walker, my favorite was Sheriff Heather Simon, who was capable, resourceful, and likeable. It’s easy to write a sheriff as someone difficult the main character has to work with or someone who puts up roadblocks, but in False Horizons Sheriff Simon is a person you would like to know in real life, someone with a neighborly demeanor who treats everyone with respect.

My only issue I did have with the book was at the beginning when the story referenced events or people in Seth’s life without any context. For example, in Chapter 1, someone named Emma is referenced, but we aren’t told if she is his wife, daughter, or past client. I started with book 2, so my knowledge is limited to only False Horizons. However, none of these events or individuals play a major role in this book so once I got past the first couple of chapters this issue did not pop-up again for me.

Thank you to the author and GoodReads for the opportunity to review the book, which I won in a GoodReads Giveaway.

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It's All About Choices and Decisions Made

Revisado: 10-19-19

I am a huge fan of Hadrian and Royce, who are two of the main characters from the Riyria books by Michael J. Sullivan. I love these two guys, their adventures, their wit and their banter. I would gladly read anything where these two characters are center stage. With that being said, this book technically falls after the The Rose and the Thorn and the before Theft of Swords, but is not necessary to know about these books to enjoy listening to this story.

The story starts with Hadrian and Royce falling into a well. They had been escorting two individuals, Wilmer – a pig farmer and Myra – a candlemaker and the owner of several pieces of a map that potentially lead to a treasure of some kind. After plummeting into the well they find themselves into a dwarven mine full of plenty of dangers.

It is suggested that Royce would have left the two a long time before the mishap into the well and forgone the money they were being paid. But that’s what you might expect from Royce. Truthfully, all any of them wanted was to find an exit out and for the expedition to be over. Eventually, everything comes down to decisions and choices they must make in order to move forward and still be alive.

Overall, I found the story entertaining and a decent way to listen to an audio book when you don’t necessarily have time or desire for a full-length book. The narrator was decent and told the story well, especially given the type of humor Hadrian and Royce stories usually bring.

Rating: 4 stars

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Just a Lot of Fun.

Revisado: 10-19-19

This full-ensemble audio book has some seriously creepy moments in it. Some of it is fun-creepy and then other times it is just creepy-creepy. But overall, I have one major question – what kind of non-real parents are sending their kids to Camp Red Moon? Out of all the youth camps in the world they are choosing to send their precious babies to a camp where robots take over and tragic deaths occur – not to mention werewolves, ghosts, and other monsters.

Thoughts:
From the outside Camp Red Moon appears to be the perfect camp. Kids love it – LOVE – and then there are so many different activities the kids can choose to do – tennis, archery, robotics, talent shows, kickball league, ropes course, canoeing, etc. It has cabins and counselors and campfires – everything that makes for the perfect camp. Except…what it also has is a lot of strange events and a lot of never-ending rumors. As R.L. Stine says in the beginning of the audio book – “Why in the brightest sunshine does the air here always carry a chill? Why do the frightening campfire stories all seem so real?” In this full-cast Audible Original, we get to hear four different short stories that begin to give us an idea of what some of what makes Camp Red Moon so special.

Episode 1 – The Werewolf in the Woods by R.L. Stine – In this story a boy, Peter, is slowly getting frustrated with his camp counselor, Danny. The camp counselor loves to tell ghost stories at campfire time. Peter tends to believe them and gets scared and ends up feeling like the camp counselor is picking on him and scaring him on purpose. Peter tries to be cool for a while, but then finally can’t take it anymore and comes up with a plan to scare him back.

Out of the four stories, The Werewolf in the Woods was my least favorite. I found Peter to be a bit of a whiner and needed to just relax about everything. I’m also not sure I completely approve of the ‘scare him back’ plan that I can’t talk about without spoiling anything.

Episode 2 – The New Camper by Dan Poblocki – This was hands down my favorite. In this story we meet Sammy, who is a new arrival at Camp Red Moon. Sammy is shy and awkward and for whatever reason doesn’t use contractions. Richard is his cabin mate and is the first one to befriend him and introduce him to everyone. But slowly Richard notices that Sammy is trailing him constantly, wearing the exact same outfits Richard does and even changes his hair to match Richards too. Everybody says Richard is making a big deal out of nothing, but….

Ok. Body snatching/changing/taking over stories creep me out. I know I’m an adult and these are geared toward the middle grade age, but I had to fast forward a few places – not because the story was bad, but because it was so good and I was getting a bit too unsettled. Nothing creepier to me than hearing someone plead over an audio book to believe that they are who they say they are.

Episode 3 – The Battle of the Bots by Justin A. Reynolds – In comparison to the other stories, especially episode 2 and 4, this was more on the fun side of creepy than scary. The Battle of the Bots is just that – a battle of robots made by the Robotics team at Camp Red Moon against the robotic team from New Horizon. Except, the robots take over the camp and it is up to the kids to get back control. This story was probably my second favorite due to the fun feeling it gave off.

Episode 4 – The Ghost in Cabin 6 by Ellen Oh. A new summer starts at Camp Red Moon. The kids all gather for first day instructions where they are reminded to avoid Cabin 6. If they don’t they will be kicked out of camp. Steven is glad to be back again at Camp Red Moon. The only problem is he has a new step-sister who annoys him. Plus, she desperately wants to check out Cabin 6. She doesn’t believe in ghosts at all and wonders what the big deal is. Except, this is Camp Red Moon and what is in Cabin 6 is a very big deal.

Overall, this was a fun batch of stories to listen to. What is interesting to me in comparison to typical audio books is how much ambient noise is added to the stories. To me, this was most noticeable in episode 4. When the parents came for Parent Day you could hear all the various background conversations going on with all the other campers and their families. Then later when a ghost story was told around a campfire all the ambient noise was removed except for the crackle of the fire and crickets chirping in the background.

Rating: 4.5

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Story Was Good, But had Trouble with Audio Version

Revisado: 10-16-19

This review focuses on the audio book version.

Prior to The Whisper Man being released, I started seeing the terrific reviews coming in for this book. I knew almost immediately I wanted to read it, but wanted to wait until October, which seemed to me to be the perfect month for this book.

Thoughts:
Initially, when I heard about the book my impression was that it was mild horror/suspense. What I found was that although there definitely is a creepy-vibe to the story and some supernatural moments, what I found was that it was more of a psychological thriller. A story about a father and son struggling after the death the wife/mother. A story about a policeman who still regrets never being able to find a young boy who was kidnapped years prior and continues to fight every day to stay sober. A policeman who has reservations about if all the right individuals were found for the murder. The story and all its developments were terrific. It was told from multiple POVs – the father, the son, the policeman. Collectively their stories were full and complete and really draw you in to care about the characters.

Audio Book Review:
I’ll be honest, I was a little disappointed in the audio book. My trouble wasn’t with the quality or production of the audio book – that was very good. I also didn’t experience any issues with hearing or being able to understand what was being said. However, what I found was that there wasn’t a variation in the speaking patterns, dialects, and accents of the different characters so that all the characters sounded very much the same. The narration itself was good, but when a character was speaking I couldn’t immediately tell who was actually speaking, which to me is a very important part of audio books.

Even though the majority of the voices sounded alike in the audio version, one voice really, really stood out. Like Danny talking with Tony in The Shining kind of good. There is a moment in the story/audio book where Jake is talking to someone or something and the voice given for this ‘character’ is so extremely creepy and supernatural-sounding. It was a very large stand out moment in the audio book.

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Folklore Comes to Life in this Middle Grade Story

Revisado: 09-20-19

Filled with interesting characters and set in a town where folklore comes to life, Malamander is the perfect choice when you need a middle grade fantasy book that is different than wizards and magic.

Thoughts:
I was in need of a fun fantasy middle grade book when I happened upon this one through the recommendation of another book blogger. I knew I didn’t necessarily have time to ‘read’ it so I picked up the audio version instead. What I found was a delightful story in a quirky little town full of folklore and interesting characters. From Lady Kraken who never leaves her room in the hotel, to Fishhook man – who has a hook for a hand, to a cat that talks…or does he?

The main story revolves around Herbie Lemon who has been hired by Violet Parma to find her parents, who were lost 12 years ago. Herbie has a job a the Grand Nautilus Hotel and he has found, returned, or kept various lost items, but never been asked to find parents who have been missing for years. Incidentally, Herbie gets paid, not by money, by being able to keep items that have been lost for over 100 years and have not been claimed by anyone. The themes in the book are similar to others you might find within middle grade – friendships, discovery of what is out there in the world as well as discovery of what is important to you and the content of your character.

Audio Book Review:
Another terrific audio book find. Narrated by Will E. Watt, we are shown not only a variety of voices and accents, but a range of emotions as he goes through the story. While listening I was able to feel the anxiety during intense dramatic or action scenes, but also able to sense the main character’s pain during one scene when he feels he might have been played the fool by Violet. A couple of the voices quite amazed me too as they sounded so different than his regular speaking voice that I took the time to listen to how he carefully changed his voice to best fit those specific characters. Will E. Watt really sells the story and was a excellent choice to portray Herbie Lemon. Through the narration, I almost felt like I was actually at the quirky town of Eerie-on-Sea and could see the mist as it rolled in. In addition to the spot-on narration, the quality of the audio production as a whole by Candlewick on Brilliance Audio was almost crystal clear.

All in all a delightful book to read and comes with an eye-catching cover that includes a few of the whimsical elements from the book. The only negative being that the book apparently has a few illustrations in it that I am not able to see when listening to it via audio.

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