Sandra C. Lopez's Blog, page 304

Review: A MOTHER’S LOSS by Jo Crow

A child therapist and a mother still mourning her son’s death ten years ago. Dr. Karen Marks has moved on since then, but her newest patient seems to be the exact replica of her son.  Suddenly, old wounds are re-opened and pain has found its way back to her heart.


Told in a diary narrative, story transitions between past and present. We learn that Karen was in the middle of an affair—lying between the sheets with a man that wasn’t her husband—when she heard about her son’s accident. On top of the brimming guilt, Karen must also contend with allegations on her dead, gay husband. Talk about a therapist needing a therapist.


Story was simply written with a rooted connection to the characters. The pace was rather slow, but the read was still fairly interesting. An okay read.


My rating: 3 stars

Review: CHANGE OF PLANS by H.K. Christie

“Here goes the first day of the rest of my life.”


Casey was an “independent, self-declared, career-focused dog lady.” What more could she possibly ask for? Certainly not marriage and babies. But, still, she liked being around Seth. Why couldn’t she get him out of her head when he was just a friend and co-worker? Why couldn’t she stop fantasizing about him, obsessing over him? Something told her that there was more there than she thought.


Casey was kind of neurotic about Seth, over-analyzing and over-thinking every move he made. You’d think that she would’ve learned from her last failed relationship.


Story was overall well-written and the characters were likable. The pace was leisurely, which was consistent throughout the book, although, at times, I wished it would’ve been a little quicker. Although it was a fairly simple read, it didn’t quite grab me. I thought it was okay.


My rating: 3 stars

Review: LITTLE GIRL by Courtney Vigo

A little girl who lost her father and resented her mother; but it all changed when her uncle moved in. “When I was little, he was fatherly. He made my lunches for school and carried me to my bed when I fell asleep in front of the TV. As I developed, it changed. I’d catch him looking at me from the corner of his eye.” (8)
It wasn’t long that she started to like the attention she was getting from men.
“[Police] read the face of a rebellious girl who got caught doing something wrong rather than a child who was being molested by her uncle and forgotten about by her mother.” (13)
Eventually, the fear, anger, and resentment were replaced with infatuation when a high school coach starts taking an interest in Paige.
Story had a slow, steady rhythm with a candid and endearing quality. It’s a distressing tale of a little girl that grew up too fast, a girl damaged beyond repair as she recounts the events of her past to a court-ordered psychiatrist. It was open and honest, and the writing was nonchalant.
Paige definitely had a delusional problem, especially when it came to the crush she developed on her coach. Her abandonment issues projected into a desire she constantly craved, a desire she transferred onto fatherly figures she never had as a child. It’s almost like she was living a double life—she would be a little girl that went to school during the day, but, at night, she’d turn into a sexual toy behind closed doors.
A raw coming-of-age story.
My rating: 3 stars

Review: THE MINER'S GOLD by Alba Arango

Image Graphic designed by Sandra Lopez

Steve, Matt, and Jenny are invited to hunt for a hidden treasure left behind by a mysterious forty-niner over a hundred and fifty years ago. As they begin to unravel the miner’s cryptic note, they realize they are not alone in the hunt for the gold.

Determined to beat the competition to the treasure, the three detectives up their game only to come face-to-face with their main competitor—the ghost of the miner himself!

 Available on Amazon


 

My review: A forty-niner's buried gold. Sounds like a job for the Decoders, a kids secret detective agency.
Steve, Matt, and Jenny have a chance to hunt for treasure and be in a movie. While working as extras, they would sneak off to seek the truth behind the legend of a miner's gold. But beware the ghost of the miner. On top of that, was something shady going on at the set?
It's a race in the hunt of this buried treasure.
Kids were smart and snarky with keen investigative skills. The Decoders were a fun combo of Indiana Jones and the Scooby gang.
A fun adventure and an intriguing mystery!
My rating: 4 stars

Review: JUNIOR PARANORMAL INVESTIGATORS: THE HAUNTING OF ROOM 909 by Michael James

“A boarded up, abandoned house—the perfect place to find a ghost!” (3)
11-year old Hannah and her brother, Ben, loved exploring with their dad, who was a paranormal investigator—a professional ghost hunter. He’s been a ghost hunter ever since their mother’s strange and unsolved disappearance. 
But what happens when the kids take the ghostly mystery into their own hands?
It a nice mystery story for middle grade audiences. The investigative language might’ve been a little too technical and scientific. Still, the story carried witty dialogue and an adventurous spirit.  It was simple but not overly enticing.
My rating: 3 stars

Review: SUBURBAN LUCHADOR: MEMOIRS FROM SUBURBIA by Philip Rivera

These are the quirky tales of a Latino father as he navigates life, marriage, and family.
It was interesting how the author correlated life’s debacles with the adventurous tales of a superhero (in this case, El Luchador.) He almost makes it out to be like a comic book, like when he relays his “crew” consisting of “Lieutenant Commander Yarei, Weapons Master Elias (my then four-year-old and heir to my throne), Chief Morale Officer Selah (my then two-year-old) and Private Pampers (Analise, my then one-month-old on her maiden voyage).” Another story compares bathing his young children to a naval attack. This style was off-beat, but it carried its infantile silliness with a warm sentiment. I mean, this is what a good father does—he plays the “hero” to his family. This guy literally made every household task an adventure. Yes, they were exaggerated in a comical fashion, which was somewhat entertaining, but the whole concept of “life is fun and games” struck me as naïve and impractical.  I kind of wished that there would’ve been more depth, something witty or profound that the reader could’ve obtained through these tales.
My rating: 3 stars

Review: DREAMLAND by Nick Clausen

"Louie had always had life-like dreams, but he'd never had a dream continuing over several nights, like chapters in a book―not until he visited Dreamland." (8)
After a few visits, Louie learns that the man in his dreams was his father, who only died in the real world but lived on in Dreamland. The first half of the story mostly deals with Louie going back and forth to Dreamland as he tries to figure out the planets and the stars. It was a bit slow. It kept on going on and on like this. As Louie stated, "Not much [going on], actually. It's mostly just Dad and me, talking." (64) There's not much going on.
I thought this would be an interesting read, but nothing really happens. In fact, it kind of puts me in DREAMLAND.
My rating: 2 stars

Review: THE SHAMEFUL ACCUSER by Rachel Woods

A night of passion. A gruesome murder. And the question remains: who could’ve wanted Harold Otty dead?


Leo and Vivian, a team of journalists, certainly questioned the mysterious tipster. If he wasn’t Harold Otty, then who was he? And what did it have to do with a money-laundering scheme?


The duo dives into the cold-blooded case, asking intelligent questions and digging deep into the inconsistencies. Was the murder a crime of passion? Or was it a means to keep the whistle-blower from exposing company secrets?


Quick and easy, the mystery was pretty captivating and well-informed. The possibilities were endless and it was easy to get lost in all these theories. I did think that there were too many characters, which opened up to even more fruitless possibilities, but, fortunately, it did not deter the focus from the case, which was deeply involved and multifaceted. I thought it was much too speculative at times, and, honestly, I was more interested in the murder than the money-laundering. It’s still a pretty good read though.  


All in all, it was great investigative journalism and a hunt for the story of the century.


My rating: 3.5 stars

Review: THE MEMORY GAME by Sharon Sant

Story is told from the POV of David, a kid who died recently and now exists as a ghost. He strolls around town, watching the people live on without him, and, just like when he was alive, he has the same flippant, insensitive attitude, especially with Bethany, who is the only one that see him.

With time, Bethany and David form a bond with mundane and rudimentary dialogue. The bulk of the book was mainly a ghost having endless talks with Invisible Girl. It was somewhat endearing.
The story had a slow start for me, and sometimes I didn’t understand the British slang, but I liked that David was there for Bethany, especially with the other kids harassing her. But the question remained: Why? Why was David there? Why was she the only one that can see him? What was this “unfinished” business? Was it because of this “memory game?” Apparently, the longer David was a ghost, the more he forgot about living, so Bethany was there to remind him (i.e. describing a PB&J and the snow.)
Ultimately, this is a story of friendship and love. An okay read.

My rating: 3 stars

Review: THE LAST YEAR by Cara Krause

Through sporadic glances outside her window, Lillian managed to get a couple of drug addicts evicted. A therapist and a mother to a 20-year old, "she was a woman with an established career, a dead husband, and...not much else," which provoked her drinking habit. (37) Then she soon gets a new view outside her window...a tall, brooding stranger, whom she can't stop looking at. "He was scholastically weird, nerdy, mysterious, and so very...sexy." (46)
Ever since then, all Lillian could think of was Felix―his touch, his taste, his feel. Too bad her daughter got to him first. Regardless, Lillian falls into a fixated and neurotic relationship with Felix. That is, if you call watching his every move a relationship. For being a therapist, she sure needed therapy herself.  
Writing was okay. It could've used more proofreading (there were too many spelling and grammatical errors to ignore.) For example, "He then climbed on top of her, kissing her as his tongue slipped down her throat." There's absolutely no way you can do all that at the same time.
I get that this was supposed to be a story of a dysfunctional woman entering a depraved world of sin and pleasure. Although it sounded enticing, story did not really impress me so much. It was kind of long and boring. Perhaps it was the superfluous details that steered it away from where it should've been. I just couldn't stay with it. 
My rating: 2 stars