Trey Stone's Blog, page 44

Book Review: Project Thermoception by M.C. Drake

(Note: I never deliberately spoil anything that I consider a major part of the plot, and I always double check to see how much is revealed in the official blurb to know what major things are already revealed and not. However, there might be minor things that certain people could consider spoilers, so read on at your own risk.)

Plot in short: Ex-military personnel led by Nicola ‘Nic’ Phillips are making a cryptid TV show. They go to Puerto Rico to hunt the Chupacabra.

Longer version: Nic and her team are making their last episode for the television series ‘Cryptid Killers’. They hear rumors of the legend of Chupacabra gaining new traction in Puerto Rico, and head down there to look for it.

Their first lead is pretty solid, a man has supposedly been murdered by the creature, and the local doctor is eager to show them the body. Except it’s been replaced, by a similar looking, but different man who doesn’t bear the unique bite marks of the Chupacabra. Coincidentally the CCTV at the hospital has been cleared.

It seems obvious the local police is on whatever is going on, but when Nic’s team meets up with them, they seem completely oblivious to what has happened. There’s also talk about other American’s going around and investigating, but they don’t match the descriptions of either Nic’s team or the local police. (So who the hell are they?!)

Following a lead of a sighting of the Chupacabra in a nearby jungle, Nic’s team and the police goes hunting for it, catches it, and kills it. But it turns out it’s just a wild animal.

However, at the same time a tour group goes missing in another nearby jungle. A tour group consisting of eleven people. Hardly seems coincidence, so Nic’s team go out there to investigate. They find exactly what they’re looking for – and more. Much, much more.

This book was excellent. The characters were well put together, the scenery was beautifully described (I really have to go to Puerto Rico if what this book make it look like is true), and the plot was really gripping. I was really invested in trying to figure out what was going on, maybe particularly so because I’m very fascinated with cryptids. I kept hoping throughout the book, that the Chupacabra was real, and that there wouldn’t be some stupid natural cause or some other explanation that kind of took the place of the creature, and thankfully I was right. And I was intrigued when it turned out the Chupacabra wasn’t as simple as the legends made it up to be. I really like the twist towards the ending and the revelation of the creature. I also particularly loved the ending. I like those kind of endings. Those endings are great. (Notice how I can’t say what kind of ending it is?).

Project Thermoception is very fast paced, many short chapters, with jumps between characters. I loved that. It’s my kind of writing style, and my kind of reading style. It kept me going, kept me on my toes. I wanted to know more and more and more, and it feels more rewarding to read three chapters than one, even though they’re both the same amount of pages.

I’d love to see more books in a series like this, focusing on different cryptids. That would be AMAZING. But sadly, due to the ending (that I can’t talk about), I’m not sure it would work? Would it? Maybe? Hopefully.

Nevertheless. Great book. Great read. Great Chupacabra. Loved it.

Check it out on Amazon, and make sure to check out M.C. Drake!

Work In Progress

One of the most fun things about writing is coming up with new things to write about! To just dream up new ideas, new plots, new places, new stories.

Currently I have 3 WIP’s that I’m definitely going to write, and 3-4 that I’m still working, to figure out whether or not I think they’ll work.

And it’s so fun! I love just exploring new ideas, designing worlds, cultures, characters and people, their plots, subplots and relationships.

But sometimes I get a bit stuck. I’ll get so comfortable with an idea, that I don’t know how to pull it in the right direction. I end up not knowing what to change, or where to take the plot, because I don’t want anything to change!

…But we all know we have to let go sometimes. So I designed a few tricks to help me evolve the WIP. These are a list of things I usually use to check if my story is going where it needs to go. I’ll take every one of these in turn, hold up against my WIP, and see if it works out better or worse, then I might throw the idea away, or keep it.

Change the genre. Does my thriller have to be a thriller? Could it work as a scifi adventure? Can I keep the same basic plotlines, but changes the subgenre completely?
Change the time and place. What if my story happened 200 years earlier? Will my story still work? What if it’s 400 years later? Can I add a dystopian element?
Reverse the roles. What if the protagonist and antagonist change places. Can I tell the same story from the reversed perspective? Will this add to or take away from my original thought? For better or worse?
Everyone swaps genders. (A smaller one, but it works great). Do my men have to be men and my women women? Is it necessary for any of my characters to be the specific gender they started out as? What can I write differently if I swap?
Antagonist is two characters. Not a split personally type of thing, no. Can I split the role the antagonist plays, in two, and give them to two separate characters? Will they be dependent on each other, and will it work?
Change perspective/storytelling. Can I tell my story backwards? (Typical Hollywood-lost-memory-flick, opening scene is actually the end.) Can I tell it from someone outside of the actual plot? (This often happens to a degree in anything that has to do with invesitgations, as they have to piece it together, but can you go even further?)
Cut or add characters. Find any character that isn’t super integral to the plot and remove them. How many are you left with, can they work out the story alone? Or, find roles for 10 new characters. What will they do, and how will they affect the story?
Timespan. Reduce the timespan of your story to one single day, 24 hours. Could it work? Is it more exciting, or just confusing? Reverse it and drag your story out across 60 years. How will such an amount of time passing affect your story? Could you add interesting subplots, or will it just be dull?

 

Please let me know in the comments how you work through your WIPs, and please add tips and tricks you use to evolve your ideas!

Book Review: Sacrosanct Blood by Roberta Balin

(Note: I never deliberately spoil anything that I consider a major part of the plot, and I always double check to see how much is revealed in the official blurb to know what major things are already revealed and not. However, there might be minor things that certain people could consider spoilers, so read on at your own risk.)

Plot in short – A group of Russian nobles, some vampires, some not, try to assassinate Grigory Rasputin.

The longer version – Russia, early 20th century – the world is engaged in the first World War. Due to political turmoil, a group of Russian nobles are worried about the outcome of the war. They worry that Grigory Rasputin – holy man and mystic – has too much influence over the Tsar Nicholas II and his family, and that Rasputin’s advice and counsel will have dire consequences for Russia and the outcome of the Great War. Rasputin must be removed. Many of the nobles are bloodthirsty ones, vampires. It’s a “condition” common amongst the nobles, and reserved for those of high standing. As they plot against Rasputin however, some of the nobles come across information leading them to believe they can’t kill Rasputin – something in his blood specifically, means he can’t be touched.

 

Well. This book was great! I have a new-found love for historical fiction, I definitely must read more of it! When I first read about this book I was half expecting vampire cults and large battles, but this book isn’t that at all (luckily – if you’re expecting Blade, Buffy or Underworld, you might be disappointed.)

The plot of this book runs SO deep, the political backdrop of the whole thing is fantastic. The scheming felt like a mix of House of Cards and Game of Thrones (but don’t be turned away if you don’t like those things – this book is so much more!) Everyone has an agenda, there’s always something to gain. The most important thing (for the vampires), is to get rid of Rasputin. But not all of them agree. Some think Rasputin is untouchable. Yet others want him gone – for the good of Russia. I became extremely gripped by trying to figure out who would end up on top in the end. I’ll drop a little hint and say it wasn’t who I thought.

I struggle with names sometimes. When I read A Song of Ice and Fire I had to keep a short notepad of names to keep track (thankfully I’d already watched 2-3 seasons of Game of Thrones). For this book I had to write some names down, particularly since they were mostly Russian names and because some people referred to others by first names, last names or nicknames.

But I loved it! I love a book that manages to be more complex than it’s reader (did I just say that I’m stupid?) It makes me feel like I’m privileged to be able to (try) to be a part of the story, it makes me have to work to understand what’s going on, to figure things out. (Not that the book is difficult in any sense, but you know what I mean? Complexity adds to the intrigue.)

The book jumps in time at certain points, and switches between third and first person storytelling. I really liked that, some of it was in the now, whilst some was told looking back at what had happened. A cool effect, and a great way to tell a story.

The ending felt a little anticlimactic at first, but only because it fooled me about what the real ending was. The actual ending was great, and made the whole story come full circle. I never saw it coming.

 

If you’re thinking about reading some great historical fiction, or if you are particularly fascinated by Russian history or the legend/myth behind Rasputin, I can defintely recommend this book!

Check it out on Amazon – and make sure you check out Roberta Balin!

Book Review: Young Blood by Brett Wallach

(Note: I never deliberately spoil anything that I consider a major part of the plot, and I always double check to see how much is revealed in the official blurb to know what major things are already revealed and not. However, there might be minor things that certain people could consider spoilers, so read on at your own risk.)

Where in the world do I start? The author warned me that the book was controversial. I’m glad he did.

The plot in short? A private investigator, Phil Allman, falls on love with a sixtewn year old he meets online. Yes. Controversial.

The longer version? Phil comes across Marci Downes on youtube, and proceeds, against his better judgment to leave her a comment. She replies, and off we go. Phil is lovestruck. What started with online chatting eventually becomes a face-to-face meeting as Phil travels across USA to meet Marci. She falls in love with as well. They become somewhat of a couple, and eventually get married.

I’ll say it first. Pedophile much? I wanted to put the book down many many times, but I’ve never not finished a book before and this wasn’t going to be the first time. After a while Phil grew on me. It became clear that he wasn’t (that much of) a creep, he just wanted Marci well. He never meant to fall in love her, he never wanted to be the forty something guy who married a teenager. But it happened. And he’s not a bad guy.

I really liked the story telling. It’s first person from Phil’s perspective, but he breaks the fourth wall to reference things in the real world, like Elvis, George Foreman, The Beatles, and a variety of celebrities. He often told med to turn to Google if I didn’t know what he was talking about. I’m sure there’s a technical writing term for all of this but I can’t think of it right now. (If you know what I mean let me know in the comments!) Basically, it’s like reading an episode of House of Cards. In the beginning I didn’t like it because I didn’t quite get it, but when I understood what was going on I loved it.

The book, despite it’s underlying theme of borderline pedophilia, is quite funny. It’s sarcastic and ironic, (often in reference to older men looking at Phil’s young wife), and I really enjoyed it. I often found myself laughing out loud. One of my favourite lines was “I would have cried, if not for the testosterone.”

I’ve never before realized how difficult it is to read about good people doing bad things. Reading about psycopathic murderers is easy because they’re so incredibly evil through and through. But Phil Allman is a good guy. (Or so he claims, and so it seems). But he keeps doing bad things, making bad choices. Not really evil things, but bad enough. For example, he knows he shouldn’t see Marci, and the reader is there, rooting for him to make the right call, to do the right thing. But he’s never able. And it’s a very facinating person to read about.

 

When I review I often try to compare things to other books, series or films, so we all can have a similar reference in mind, and so people who love said thing can better come to understand what the thing I’m reviewing is like. But with this book I can’t say I have anything to compare it to. The only thing that comes close, is maybe Californication with David Duchovny. The way he makes poor life choices (constantly), reminded me of this book.

 

All in all, a great book, however controversial it may be or not. I wouldn’t recommend reading it poolside in Spain, but if you’re gripped by darker stories that show you how bad good men can be, give this a try.

Amazon

Brett Wallach

Thank you!

Just wanted to write a short post, saying thank you to everyone who downloaded my book! I’m eternally grateful for all the response!

If every reader did this whenever an indie author gave out a free book, the world would be a much happier place, I’m sure (at least for the authors!)

Thanks again!

Free Ebook!

Just wanted to let you all know that my crime thriller, The Consequence of Loyalty is free on Amazon this weekend!

Get it here!

US version

UK version

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And you get bonus points if you read it, with a cherry on top if you leave me a review!

Thanks all!

Trey Stone

Some advice when asking for reviews

Like many other authors I review books, because well hey, I read!

So here are a few things to do and don’t when you’re asking someone to review your work. (And though these are my own opinions, I dare assume they will apply to many other author/reviewers as well).

 

DO

Ask! Don’t just send me an email with your pdf or epub saying, “please review.” I don’t mind if you attach the book to begin with, but please ask whether or not I’d like to review it!
Tell me about your book! The blurb or description from Amazon is fine, but please(!) more than a few words! If you’ve found time to paste the link to your book on Amazon, you might as well copy paste the description as well. Also tell me the genre please!
Specifiy which book! If you’ve written several books and you send me a link to your author’s page, making me pick one out to buy and review, you’re not really asking for reviews are you? You’re trying to sell.

 

DON’T

Get offended! I might not like the sound of your book, I might have read seven other books in the same genre recently, or I might have other personal reasons to not wan’t to read it. Please don’t yell at me, there are plenty of readers out there, I’m sure you’ll find your luck with someone else.
Argue. I offered to review your book. That’s MY opinion of YOUR work. I would never drag someone through the mud intentionally, but I will say what I think of your book. More often than not it’s all positive stuff.
Expect me to pay. This sounds really cheap, but notice how I underlined expect. I might very well want to buy your book, but due to the sheer amount of free books people are handing out for reviews, chances are slim unless you dazzle me with an amazing blurb. But by all means, let me know if your book is on offer!
Rush me. I try to be very generous in the amount of books I accept, which leads to a never-ending TBR list. Chances are it will be months until my review is posted. So unless you have plans of being a best-seller overnight, have some patience. If I accepted to review your book, your review will come.

Book Review: Earth – Last Sanctuary by Christian Kallias

Earth – Last Sanctuary (Universe in Flames I) by Christian Kallias

Note: I never deliberately spoil anything that I consider a major part of the plot, and I always double check to see how much is revealed in the official blurb to know what major things are already revealed and not. However, there might be minor things that certain people could consider spoilers, so read on at your own risk.

Plot: In short? An alien society is destroyed by enemies, they seek refuge in the corner of the universe, finds Earth and allies along the way.

Longer version? The Star Alliance is attacked, with devastating results. Fleeing to stay alive, the survivors with Lieutenant Chase Athanatos at the helm end up in an unknown corner of the universe. Right next to Earth.

Desperately in need of allies, and seeing as they are to blame for what happens next, the Star Alliance fight of the pursuing enemies and save Earth, which wins them their alliance. However, it’s only a matter of time before the next attack happens, and the remainders of the Star Alliance and their new friends on Earth have to work together to prepare the highly undeveloped planet for the next battle.

 

Review: Wow! I don’t even know where to start. This book is fun! I never knew I liked space opera this much until I read this. The book is light and funny but keeps you hooked in constantly, waiting for them to figure out their next move. He also keeps throwing out these little tidbits of mystery (not always relating to the main objective at hand), that just kept me turning pages upon pages.

Christian does this cool thing where he pulls in Earth’s own ancient history in a way that makes it highly relevant to the alien race of his story (by that I mean the protagonists’ race), and I found that to be hugely exciting to read. It works so great with developing his characters, giving them a sense of who they are, finding their own connection to Earth, as well as driving the plot and adding mystery to it. When it was first introduced it was to add purpose to the characters, but how they were connected to the particular piece of history wasn’t revealed. It was nearly infuriating that I was given a little piece of the puzzle without the rest, but it just kept me hooked.

And then we have the alien race “discovering” earth. This is another awesome effect, that gives the whole story a really unique perspective. We’re reading about ourselves as someone else (reader’s of this blog are from Earth yes?), seeing how they react to the way our world works, and it’s marvellous. It really makes you think about how the world works and it made me smile on several occasions.

 

Favorite: Character? By far Ryonna. Not surprisingly, it wasn’t any of the main characters, Chase or Sarah, but Ryonna the Droxian warrior. She’s the most badass woman I’ve ever read, putting the other characters to shame with her silver sword. I was sad to see her go when she left the main story to follow her side quest, but luckily for me, Christian has covered that in his other book, “Ryonna’s Trials”. I need this.

Scene? It’s difficult to say (especially without spoiling the book), but I can say that I absolutely loved the ending, and that I was right! (When am I not right?) Seeing as this is a series of nine books, it’s not unnatural that the book ends on bit of a cliffhanger, but don’t worry, the cliff isn’t very tall or steep. You’ll want to read the next book.

Also, did I mention that Christian managed to reference pikachu in between space battles, alien warrior princesses and Earth being dooomed. I’d read all of his books just for that.

 

If you like: Star Wars, Star Trek, Stargate (SG-1 or other), Battlestar Galactica, Star craft… I could go on, basically anything with a star in it! If you love it, you’ll love this! I even kept thinking of the Halo series, and Riddick a couple of times, which is a big plus in my book! If you love space battles, aliens, futuristic technology… and I don’t know, saving the universe? Go read this. This has completely rebooted my love for scifi and space opera, I need more.

The only bad thing about Christian Kallais’ writing is that there’s too much of it! With nine books out in the series already, and more to come, it will be ages until I’ll have time to get through it all.

Absolutely recommended for any Sci-Fi lover!

ALSO! Did I mention this book is free?!

Make sure you check out Christian Kallias on his website and twitter, not at least his books!

 

Book Reviews!

Are you an author? Self-published something? Struggling to get reviews and/or find reviewers?

Well so am I.

So I’ve decided to do something about it!

I read quite a lot. Sometimes more than others, sometimes sporadically, sometimes I’ll have a reading break for weeks or months, and sometimes I’ll read two books on a weekend.

I’d always planned to write reviews here on my blog, but now I’ve decided to do it a bit more offical.

I figured, if I’m going to be reading and reviewing books anyway, I might as well try and help the authors of those books at the same time!

So if you’re looking to get more reviews, head over to my Book Reviews page for more details!

I’m looking forward to hearing from you, and to read your work!

Also, don’t forget to subscribe!

Leave a Review!

I recently did a free book promotion for my book The Consequence of Loyalty. And now I want to urge everyone to leave a review. (Of course I do, as an author I live and breathe for reviews, I’d rather have reviews than sales at this point, as do most author who aren’t already racking it in).

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But I’m not just talking about me! I’m not even talking about books specifically!

I want to urge you to leave a review for everything. (Though I’m definitely particularly invested in book reviews). I want to urge you to leave a review when you visit a place, go to a restaurant, go to a shop, anything!

Google will let you review just about anything that you can find on a map, and probably things you can’t as well. When was the last thing you did? It might seem like an insignificant thing to do, but it could mean soooo much to someone else. And I’m not (just) talking about the owner/author, but also every other possible future customer.

The last thing I reviewed (other than books) was a hotel I was staying at recently. Though, now that I think of it, I didn’t leave a single review for any of the restaurants I visited when I was there.

Many places and websites will also ask you to leave a review or participate in a survey, often with a chance to win something in return. Do you? I know I’ll often say that I will, and then forget about it as soon as I leave.

 

So it’s a good thing Amazon makes it so easy to leave a review! Just log in, hit the stars, write a few words however long or short you want and you’re done! And though it might not mean much to you to do it, it definitely does for a lot of other people!

So please, leave a review, always!

Don’t forget to sign up to my mailing list!