Wesley Britton's Blog, page 26
November 15, 2017
Planet of the Apes book review redux
My September 19 review of Bright Eyes, Ape City: Examining the Planet of the Apes Mythos Edited by Rich Handley and Joseph F. Berenato
Was just reposted at the new Book Review blog. The permalink
Is:
https://thenewbookreview.blogspot.com...
Was just reposted at the new Book Review blog. The permalink
Is:
https://thenewbookreview.blogspot.com...
Moving Target: The History and Evolution of Green Arrow
Sequart Releases Moving Target: The History and Evolution of Green Arrow
Moving Target: The History and Evolution of Green Arrow is now in Current Previews Catalog
This collection is the definitive analysis of the Emerald Archer, from his Golden Age origins to his small screen adventures and beyond. Exploring overlooked chapters of Green Arrow’s life, and those of alter ego Oliver Queen, this book shows that Green Arrow has never been just one thing, but rather a perpetually moving target. Includes new interviews with Green Arrow creators from across the decades, including Neal Adams, Mike Grell, Chuck Dixon, Phil Hester, Brad Meltzer, and Jeff Lemire.
The book runs 338 pages and features a foreword by Phil Hester, in addition to the high-profile interviews mentioned above.
Please don’t assume that your comics retailer will order any copies; you should make it a point to tell him / her that you want one, using code NOV172163.
Official book page:
http://sequart.org/magazine/67197/seq...
Moving Target: The History and Evolution of Green Arrow is now in Current Previews Catalog
This collection is the definitive analysis of the Emerald Archer, from his Golden Age origins to his small screen adventures and beyond. Exploring overlooked chapters of Green Arrow’s life, and those of alter ego Oliver Queen, this book shows that Green Arrow has never been just one thing, but rather a perpetually moving target. Includes new interviews with Green Arrow creators from across the decades, including Neal Adams, Mike Grell, Chuck Dixon, Phil Hester, Brad Meltzer, and Jeff Lemire.
The book runs 338 pages and features a foreword by Phil Hester, in addition to the high-profile interviews mentioned above.
Please don’t assume that your comics retailer will order any copies; you should make it a point to tell him / her that you want one, using code NOV172163.
Official book page:
http://sequart.org/magazine/67197/seq...
November 10, 2017
Rate Beta-Earth books at Goodreads
Just checked the Beta-Earth Chronicles series Goodreads page, and see Return to Alpha has been added:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0778JDBX7
I also see The Third Earth and Return to Alpha are the only two books with no ratings at all. If you folks can swing by and do a rating sometime, that would help the cause (I hope) . . .
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0778JDBX7
I also see The Third Earth and Return to Alpha are the only two books with no ratings at all. If you folks can swing by and do a rating sometime, that would help the cause (I hope) . . .
November 9, 2017
Sponsor Wes Britton and Enjoy a 15% Discount for Return to Alpha!
To get involved with helping spread the word about the publication of Return to Alpha, please join our DayCause campaign! Sponsor Wes Britton and post a feature about Return to Alpha or put up a Tweet or FB post to join the campaign!
Find out how you can support the cause at:
https://www.daycause.com/kkantasautho...
While I’m here, let me remind you that, Through December 31, 2017, 12:00 p.m. (EST), all of BearManor Media’s e-books are 15% off! That includes all of the Beta-Earth Chronicles, books 1-6 including the brand-new Return to Alpha!
Visit BearManor Media’s ebook store on Selz.com at:
https://bearmanormedia.selz.com/
Fill out your shopping cart, and then
enter the discount code:
X05RCWUZ
What a great opportunity to collect the entire Beta-Earth series at a discount price!
Merry Christmas from the Multi-Verse!
Find out how you can support the cause at:
https://www.daycause.com/kkantasautho...
While I’m here, let me remind you that, Through December 31, 2017, 12:00 p.m. (EST), all of BearManor Media’s e-books are 15% off! That includes all of the Beta-Earth Chronicles, books 1-6 including the brand-new Return to Alpha!
Visit BearManor Media’s ebook store on Selz.com at:
https://bearmanormedia.selz.com/
Fill out your shopping cart, and then
enter the discount code:
X05RCWUZ
What a great opportunity to collect the entire Beta-Earth series at a discount price!
Merry Christmas from the Multi-Verse!
Introducing the main cast of Return to Alpha!
As Return to Alpha is now available for your fall entertainment, I thought I'd whet your appetite by providing this list of the primary characters, all brand new to the Beta-Earth Chronicles--
Cast of Main Characters
Malcolm Renbourn II: The Betan son of his namesake and his mother, Sasperia Thorwaif Renbourn, the Ducei of Bercumel, a member of the ruling Mentala of the country of Alma. His birth had come about under special circumstances. His mother was from a bloodline manipulated by the scientists of the Collective that had given her mutant enhancements both physical and mental in the hopes of defeating the genetic Plague-With-No-Name. Sasperia Thorwaif was able to throw huge boulders long distances and leap into trees. Mentally, she could remember everything she had ever heard.
When the Alman War erupted, Sasperia, now pregnant with her twins, Malcolm II and Gunnar, was imprisoned which is where her sons were born. The father’s plague-free Alpha genes, combined with Sasperia’s enhanced metabolism could “jump over” the diseased genes in Betans, resulting in a genetic ladder that could be given to all Beta mothers whose children would be free of the curse that had defined their world for as long as history had memory.
While an infant when it happened, Malcolm Renbourn II had long been praised as being one-half of the salvation of Beta-Earth. As his father had been taken to Cerapin-Earth when he was very young, Malcolm II had no personal memories of his father beyond the international legacy the Alpha-Man had left behind. Malcolm II too had the legacy of his mother’s mutant genetics and the more than likely destiny that he would one day take her seat in the Alman Mentala, a future responsibility he had dreaded since childhood.
Kalmeg Renbourn: Kalmeg is almost an exact duplicate of her mother, Kalma Salk Renbourn, a richly chocolate brown-skinned woman from the country of Balnakin on Beta-Earth. Kalmeg is equally dark, and shares her mother’s entrancing and distinctive golden-yellow eyes. Like her mother, and most all Balnakin women for that matter, Kalmeg is an intense personality who does not suffer fools gladly and despises anything she consideres wasting time.
Unlike her half-brother, Malcolm Renbourn II, Kalmeg had lost both her birth-parents when she was but an infant. Kalma Renbourn had unhappily joined with her husband and four of her bond-sisters to go to Cerapin earth. So her daughter had been raised by the mothers who remained on Beta—Sasperia, Elena, Doret, and Jona—as well as some of her older half-sisters not to mention considerable affection and interest from her grand-parents and many of her mother’s family who were never strangers in her life.
A woman of many abilities, Kalmeg has always found it difficult to find a distinguishing role for herself in a tribe so large, so spread in its international reach, with such a powerful history on three continents. By going to Alpha-Earth on the “merivurn,” she can show the same bravery as both her birth-parents. She can represent the dark-skinned bloodline of not only Tribe Renbourn, but Beta-Earth as a whole.
Olrei Renbourn: While born on Serapin-Earth, Olrei’s mother, Elsbeth Cawl Renbourn, had been one of the five Betan wives who had accompanied their husband on the second cross-versal jump from Beta to Serapin. Back on Beta, Elsbeth and her prophetess sister, Lorei, had been the first wives of Malcolm Renbourn, “The Alpha Man.” In the years to come, Elsbeth had born four Alpha-Beta heirs, children that tore at her heart when she and the other members of her family had to leave their rich and full lives behind to do the bidding of the often harsh deities.
Olrei was Elsbeth’s first child on Cerapin, and her origins were more than special. For while Olrei was still in her mother’s womb, Elsbeth sat at the bedside of her dying birth sister who was being transfigured into a spiritual entity in her final moments. Before her passing, Lorei touched Elsbeth and sent into her offspring Lorei’s powerful gift of prophecy. From her birth, her father always said Olrei’s face was that of an “old soul,” looking much wiser than her years.
Still, Olrei Renbourn was much like her warm, gentle, nurturing mother. While Elsbeth had always thought of herself as a simple, plain-faced farm girl, no one would call Olrei plain. She has a girlish, feminine, welcoming face that has a reddish hue. Her eyelashes are so long and thick, she cann’t blink without seeming to be flirtatious even when flirting is the last thing on her mind. Her face matches her rounded, curvaceous figure that is another gift from her mother.
Malcolm Renbourn III: Born on Cerapin-Earth, the sixteen year old Malcolm Renbourn III is the first son of Malcolm Renbourn and Pidghe El, one half of the identical sisters who became the last of Malcolm Renbourn’s wives. As his mother didn’t have the typical Cerapin characteristics of large lobes or protruding chins, Malcolm III also only bears subtle signs of his Cerapin bloodline. He has a comparatively flat forehead and a more Alphan-like chin than most of his species, but his skin is unusually gray-tinged with the Cerapin markings of colors all across his body. His face is filled with the confidence of youth, his lower lip pushed out as if he is challenging and daring the world to take him on.
Hamed El and Le: An identical pair of brothers from Cerapin-Earth, the Hameds are the pilots for the “Marivurn” spaceship, a craft especially designed to cross the multi-verse on the day when a window between the three universes open to such travel.
Each brother has the puffy forehead-lobes that cover the organs that permit them to not only share their thoughts, but also their physical sensations together at exactly the same times. The Hameds had the usual long, wolfish teeth of Cerapins and, most obviously of all, shared the huge, protruding, squared jaws that would have made them look simian if they had any facial hair. Like most of their kind, they only have hair on the tops of their heads, but it is cropped so short, they look nearly bald.
Their bodies have natural markings on their otherwise grey skins, multi-colored splotches, streaks, and uneven stripes illustrating their limbs and torsos. Like all their kind, they have extremely large feet.
Without question, the Hameds are among the most courageous Cerapin pairs in their planet’s history. Because of the specialized operating systems of the Merivurn,” only a pair could do all the coordinated steps necessary in the seconds it took to go from launch to ascent to the barrier-jump—the most painstaking and precise of all their calibrations—to descent to landing. On two planets. Only a pair with interconnected minds could move quickly enough. And volunteering to pilot the “Marivurn” meant the Hameds were going on a one-way voyage with no return home possible.
Major Mary Carpenter: A former infiltrator in the Western Alliance on Alpha-Earth, Mary was transferred to the battleship Clinton of the Southern Union where she was tasked with interrogating the aliens from Beta and Serapin. When they are taken to the elaborate prison called The Citadel, Mary becomes their principal watcher.
Doubtful of most of the alien’s claims, Mary’s religious beliefs preclude her accepting the cosmic missions described by the Renbourns. Beautiful, intelligent, and trained in many military skills, Mary quickly catches the eye of Malcolm Renbourn II.
Akito Kawahara: A Japanese-American confined to the Citadel after his parents are convicted of spying for the Japanese. An electronics expert, Akito is enamored with Olrei Renbourn with whom he shares a blossoming romance.
Cast of Main Characters
Malcolm Renbourn II: The Betan son of his namesake and his mother, Sasperia Thorwaif Renbourn, the Ducei of Bercumel, a member of the ruling Mentala of the country of Alma. His birth had come about under special circumstances. His mother was from a bloodline manipulated by the scientists of the Collective that had given her mutant enhancements both physical and mental in the hopes of defeating the genetic Plague-With-No-Name. Sasperia Thorwaif was able to throw huge boulders long distances and leap into trees. Mentally, she could remember everything she had ever heard.
When the Alman War erupted, Sasperia, now pregnant with her twins, Malcolm II and Gunnar, was imprisoned which is where her sons were born. The father’s plague-free Alpha genes, combined with Sasperia’s enhanced metabolism could “jump over” the diseased genes in Betans, resulting in a genetic ladder that could be given to all Beta mothers whose children would be free of the curse that had defined their world for as long as history had memory.
While an infant when it happened, Malcolm Renbourn II had long been praised as being one-half of the salvation of Beta-Earth. As his father had been taken to Cerapin-Earth when he was very young, Malcolm II had no personal memories of his father beyond the international legacy the Alpha-Man had left behind. Malcolm II too had the legacy of his mother’s mutant genetics and the more than likely destiny that he would one day take her seat in the Alman Mentala, a future responsibility he had dreaded since childhood.
Kalmeg Renbourn: Kalmeg is almost an exact duplicate of her mother, Kalma Salk Renbourn, a richly chocolate brown-skinned woman from the country of Balnakin on Beta-Earth. Kalmeg is equally dark, and shares her mother’s entrancing and distinctive golden-yellow eyes. Like her mother, and most all Balnakin women for that matter, Kalmeg is an intense personality who does not suffer fools gladly and despises anything she consideres wasting time.
Unlike her half-brother, Malcolm Renbourn II, Kalmeg had lost both her birth-parents when she was but an infant. Kalma Renbourn had unhappily joined with her husband and four of her bond-sisters to go to Cerapin earth. So her daughter had been raised by the mothers who remained on Beta—Sasperia, Elena, Doret, and Jona—as well as some of her older half-sisters not to mention considerable affection and interest from her grand-parents and many of her mother’s family who were never strangers in her life.
A woman of many abilities, Kalmeg has always found it difficult to find a distinguishing role for herself in a tribe so large, so spread in its international reach, with such a powerful history on three continents. By going to Alpha-Earth on the “merivurn,” she can show the same bravery as both her birth-parents. She can represent the dark-skinned bloodline of not only Tribe Renbourn, but Beta-Earth as a whole.
Olrei Renbourn: While born on Serapin-Earth, Olrei’s mother, Elsbeth Cawl Renbourn, had been one of the five Betan wives who had accompanied their husband on the second cross-versal jump from Beta to Serapin. Back on Beta, Elsbeth and her prophetess sister, Lorei, had been the first wives of Malcolm Renbourn, “The Alpha Man.” In the years to come, Elsbeth had born four Alpha-Beta heirs, children that tore at her heart when she and the other members of her family had to leave their rich and full lives behind to do the bidding of the often harsh deities.
Olrei was Elsbeth’s first child on Cerapin, and her origins were more than special. For while Olrei was still in her mother’s womb, Elsbeth sat at the bedside of her dying birth sister who was being transfigured into a spiritual entity in her final moments. Before her passing, Lorei touched Elsbeth and sent into her offspring Lorei’s powerful gift of prophecy. From her birth, her father always said Olrei’s face was that of an “old soul,” looking much wiser than her years.
Still, Olrei Renbourn was much like her warm, gentle, nurturing mother. While Elsbeth had always thought of herself as a simple, plain-faced farm girl, no one would call Olrei plain. She has a girlish, feminine, welcoming face that has a reddish hue. Her eyelashes are so long and thick, she cann’t blink without seeming to be flirtatious even when flirting is the last thing on her mind. Her face matches her rounded, curvaceous figure that is another gift from her mother.
Malcolm Renbourn III: Born on Cerapin-Earth, the sixteen year old Malcolm Renbourn III is the first son of Malcolm Renbourn and Pidghe El, one half of the identical sisters who became the last of Malcolm Renbourn’s wives. As his mother didn’t have the typical Cerapin characteristics of large lobes or protruding chins, Malcolm III also only bears subtle signs of his Cerapin bloodline. He has a comparatively flat forehead and a more Alphan-like chin than most of his species, but his skin is unusually gray-tinged with the Cerapin markings of colors all across his body. His face is filled with the confidence of youth, his lower lip pushed out as if he is challenging and daring the world to take him on.
Hamed El and Le: An identical pair of brothers from Cerapin-Earth, the Hameds are the pilots for the “Marivurn” spaceship, a craft especially designed to cross the multi-verse on the day when a window between the three universes open to such travel.
Each brother has the puffy forehead-lobes that cover the organs that permit them to not only share their thoughts, but also their physical sensations together at exactly the same times. The Hameds had the usual long, wolfish teeth of Cerapins and, most obviously of all, shared the huge, protruding, squared jaws that would have made them look simian if they had any facial hair. Like most of their kind, they only have hair on the tops of their heads, but it is cropped so short, they look nearly bald.
Their bodies have natural markings on their otherwise grey skins, multi-colored splotches, streaks, and uneven stripes illustrating their limbs and torsos. Like all their kind, they have extremely large feet.
Without question, the Hameds are among the most courageous Cerapin pairs in their planet’s history. Because of the specialized operating systems of the Merivurn,” only a pair could do all the coordinated steps necessary in the seconds it took to go from launch to ascent to the barrier-jump—the most painstaking and precise of all their calibrations—to descent to landing. On two planets. Only a pair with interconnected minds could move quickly enough. And volunteering to pilot the “Marivurn” meant the Hameds were going on a one-way voyage with no return home possible.
Major Mary Carpenter: A former infiltrator in the Western Alliance on Alpha-Earth, Mary was transferred to the battleship Clinton of the Southern Union where she was tasked with interrogating the aliens from Beta and Serapin. When they are taken to the elaborate prison called The Citadel, Mary becomes their principal watcher.
Doubtful of most of the alien’s claims, Mary’s religious beliefs preclude her accepting the cosmic missions described by the Renbourns. Beautiful, intelligent, and trained in many military skills, Mary quickly catches the eye of Malcolm Renbourn II.
Akito Kawahara: A Japanese-American confined to the Citadel after his parents are convicted of spying for the Japanese. An electronics expert, Akito is enamored with Olrei Renbourn with whom he shares a blossoming romance.
Return to Alpha has arrived!
At long last! Return to Alpha, the sixth book of the Beta-Earth Chronicles, just went up at Amazon! Experience what our earth will be like 40 years in the future after global warming, the deveastation of waves of biological weapons, and the surprisingly unwelcome news we’re not alone in the universe.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0778JDBX7
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0778JDBX7
November 7, 2017
Book Review: Late Apex by Jeremy DeConcini
Late Apex
Jeremy DeConcini
Print Length: 231 pages
Publication Date: October 6, 2017
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
ASIN: B075Y976D7
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B075Y976D7/...
Reviewed by Dr. Wesley Britton
In previous reviews of Jeremy DeConcini’s three Ben Adams novels, some readers have observed similarities with Tom Clancy thrillers. Others note comparisons with John MacDonald’s Travis McGee. I concur on both counts.
I often thought of Clancy during the first quarter or so of Late Apex. That’s because of the layered structure where author DeConcini introduced all of his major players in their various international settings in alternating descriptive passages. Then, I forgot all about Clancy when DeConcini focuses on his primary protagonist, Ben Adams, and it’s hard not to think of McGee, even if Adams is far more West Coast in his tastes and interests.
Ben Adams is a former FBI agent who spent time in jail for accidently killing a DEA agent. His new quest is to stay out of prison while enjoying surfing, drinking beer on the beach, hanging with his dog Geronimo, and watching motorcycle races. But the FBI, in the person of Howard Goodman, wants Adams to go undercover and he best comply to keep his freedom. He must help the Department of Homeland Security stop ISIS from getting key trigger devices for a nuclear weapon. This means he must infiltrate the inner circle around Giancarlo Trentino, the head of an U.S. defense contractor more interested in profits than potential global consequences. Or, at least, that’s what we are led to believe.
By the last third of the novel, few readers will be thinking of Travis McGee anymore but might instead think of other novelists like Geoffrey Jenkins or Peter Vollmer who know the South African terrain intimately, especially writers who know the means to survive when nature and various groups of killers are after you. In this long, vivid, and very exciting section of the book, Adams is very much on his own, encountering a series of surprising allies and mysterious adversaries. I must admit, the conclusion is rather abrupt and there are unresolved matters left dangling. So a fourth book might be in the offing, despite the series being described as a trilogy?
As is often the case for such thrillers, the verisimilitude comes from the author’s personal experience like DeConcini’s tenure as a Special Agent for the Department of Homeland Security. Thus, his use of interdepartmental conflicts rings perfectly true. In addition, his focus on the quirky and very individualistic Adams and Adams’ race from those out to get him keeps the novel from following familiar formulas.
In short, I can easily recommend Late Apex to anyone who likes entertaining thrillers with a very personal focus. Character matters even in an extremely fast-paced story full of surprises and clever twists. It’s the sort of book that encourages me to want to read the two books that preceded it and hope that dangling conclusion isn’t the end of the saga.
This review first appeared at BookPleasures.com on Nov. 7, 2017:
https://is.gd/lusUxF
Jeremy DeConcini
Print Length: 231 pages
Publication Date: October 6, 2017
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
ASIN: B075Y976D7
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B075Y976D7/...
Reviewed by Dr. Wesley Britton
In previous reviews of Jeremy DeConcini’s three Ben Adams novels, some readers have observed similarities with Tom Clancy thrillers. Others note comparisons with John MacDonald’s Travis McGee. I concur on both counts.
I often thought of Clancy during the first quarter or so of Late Apex. That’s because of the layered structure where author DeConcini introduced all of his major players in their various international settings in alternating descriptive passages. Then, I forgot all about Clancy when DeConcini focuses on his primary protagonist, Ben Adams, and it’s hard not to think of McGee, even if Adams is far more West Coast in his tastes and interests.
Ben Adams is a former FBI agent who spent time in jail for accidently killing a DEA agent. His new quest is to stay out of prison while enjoying surfing, drinking beer on the beach, hanging with his dog Geronimo, and watching motorcycle races. But the FBI, in the person of Howard Goodman, wants Adams to go undercover and he best comply to keep his freedom. He must help the Department of Homeland Security stop ISIS from getting key trigger devices for a nuclear weapon. This means he must infiltrate the inner circle around Giancarlo Trentino, the head of an U.S. defense contractor more interested in profits than potential global consequences. Or, at least, that’s what we are led to believe.
By the last third of the novel, few readers will be thinking of Travis McGee anymore but might instead think of other novelists like Geoffrey Jenkins or Peter Vollmer who know the South African terrain intimately, especially writers who know the means to survive when nature and various groups of killers are after you. In this long, vivid, and very exciting section of the book, Adams is very much on his own, encountering a series of surprising allies and mysterious adversaries. I must admit, the conclusion is rather abrupt and there are unresolved matters left dangling. So a fourth book might be in the offing, despite the series being described as a trilogy?
As is often the case for such thrillers, the verisimilitude comes from the author’s personal experience like DeConcini’s tenure as a Special Agent for the Department of Homeland Security. Thus, his use of interdepartmental conflicts rings perfectly true. In addition, his focus on the quirky and very individualistic Adams and Adams’ race from those out to get him keeps the novel from following familiar formulas.
In short, I can easily recommend Late Apex to anyone who likes entertaining thrillers with a very personal focus. Character matters even in an extremely fast-paced story full of surprises and clever twists. It’s the sort of book that encourages me to want to read the two books that preceded it and hope that dangling conclusion isn’t the end of the saga.
This review first appeared at BookPleasures.com on Nov. 7, 2017:
https://is.gd/lusUxF
November 6, 2017
New hot review for The Third Earth!
Just spotted this wonderful review at Amazon for The Third Earth:
Awesome sci-fi read!
ByAmazon Customer on November 5, 2017
Format: Kindle Edition
What an interesting science fiction read! This book was an awesome escape from my daily life, as I was completed engrossed in the world of these characters and the journey they took through each and every page. Author Wesley Britton brings an incredible concept to life in this read- a truly creative and futuristic story unlike any other I’ve come across. The story begins with the main character, Dr. Malcolm Renbourn, describing his lives in two previous Earths to the readers- first a history teacher, then a blind alien. He sets the stage to help the readers understand where he came from and how he came to arrive at the third earth. I loved how the narrator spoke directly to the readers in this book, how he openly shares his experiences. It gives the read an intimately personal feel, despite the science fiction genre of the novel. In addition to the fast-moving plot and likable characters, The Third Earth was written with captivating detail. I could close my eyes and picture everything that was happening, from the characters to the settings. Readers won’t be able to put this book down once they start. Entertaining, innovative, engaging- The Third Earth was a truly enjoyable read. I’ll definitely be recommending to friends and family.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-re...
Here's the direct Amazon link to The Third Earth:
http://bit.ly/TTEAMA
Awesome sci-fi read!
ByAmazon Customer on November 5, 2017
Format: Kindle Edition
What an interesting science fiction read! This book was an awesome escape from my daily life, as I was completed engrossed in the world of these characters and the journey they took through each and every page. Author Wesley Britton brings an incredible concept to life in this read- a truly creative and futuristic story unlike any other I’ve come across. The story begins with the main character, Dr. Malcolm Renbourn, describing his lives in two previous Earths to the readers- first a history teacher, then a blind alien. He sets the stage to help the readers understand where he came from and how he came to arrive at the third earth. I loved how the narrator spoke directly to the readers in this book, how he openly shares his experiences. It gives the read an intimately personal feel, despite the science fiction genre of the novel. In addition to the fast-moving plot and likable characters, The Third Earth was written with captivating detail. I could close my eyes and picture everything that was happening, from the characters to the settings. Readers won’t be able to put this book down once they start. Entertaining, innovative, engaging- The Third Earth was a truly enjoyable read. I’ll definitely be recommending to friends and family.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-re...
Here's the direct Amazon link to The Third Earth:
http://bit.ly/TTEAMA
November 5, 2017
Book Review: Soldiers of ZED: Book 1 - Tripton-Z Series by WR Peden
Soldiers of ZED: Book 1 - Tripton-Z Series
WR Peden
Print Length: 149 pages
Publication Date: July 1, 2017
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
ASIN: B072Q2L4RB
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072Q2L4RB/...
Reviewed by Dr. Wesley Britton
Zombies again. The only thing more relentless than zombie walkers coming at ya on the small screen is the never-ending avalanche of zombie novels with a wide variety of approaches from zombie turkeys to zombie tetherball in the high school down the street.
In WR Peden’s fast-paced entry in the genre, we’re quickly tossed into the action when Cordell Banks, an Iraqi war vet and family man with huge gaps in his memory, finds himself trying to escape from a horde of zombies in a downtown hotel. How did he get there? He doesn’t remember. In short order, he’s surrounded by members of the Soldiers of Zed military group who take out the zombies and inform Banks about their private headquarters as the official U.S. Government apparently no longer exists.
In equally short order, Banks rescues a young man named DJ from yet more zombies and the two begin a cross-country journey to find the Soldiers of Zed base and escape from the clutches of another quasi-military outfit calling itself the Silent Soldiers. It’s not clear what the Silent Soldiers want from the pair, but Banks and DJ are continually on the run from them as well as the inevitable seas of mindless but easy to kill zombies wandering pretty much everywhere.
Soldiers of Zed is non-stop action with Banks and DJ, as well as the reader, rarely able to pause to catch our breaths. At such a pace, despite the story being told in the first person (From Banks perspective), we don’t get much reflection or philosophical thought about what it all means. While we know Banks is looking for his family, we see only occasional flashes from his memories and not many emotional tugs regarding the quest.
Mostly, we get a detailed and vivid play-by-play of Banks’s actions, both the planning and then execution.
This isn’t one of those speculative fiction outings with a message or theme or warning. It’s a straight-ahead grim and often grisly roller-coaster of a ride. In the end, Soldiers of Zed is strictly for zombie fans, and there’s no shortage of such folks. I suspect their favorite words in the book will be in the title—book one. Obviously, there’s more to come and if you make it to the cliff-hanger ending, book two won’t arrive soon enough.
This review first appeared at BookPleasures.com on Nov. 5, 2017:
http://dpli.ir/09W8Mm
WR Peden
Print Length: 149 pages
Publication Date: July 1, 2017
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
ASIN: B072Q2L4RB
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072Q2L4RB/...
Reviewed by Dr. Wesley Britton
Zombies again. The only thing more relentless than zombie walkers coming at ya on the small screen is the never-ending avalanche of zombie novels with a wide variety of approaches from zombie turkeys to zombie tetherball in the high school down the street.
In WR Peden’s fast-paced entry in the genre, we’re quickly tossed into the action when Cordell Banks, an Iraqi war vet and family man with huge gaps in his memory, finds himself trying to escape from a horde of zombies in a downtown hotel. How did he get there? He doesn’t remember. In short order, he’s surrounded by members of the Soldiers of Zed military group who take out the zombies and inform Banks about their private headquarters as the official U.S. Government apparently no longer exists.
In equally short order, Banks rescues a young man named DJ from yet more zombies and the two begin a cross-country journey to find the Soldiers of Zed base and escape from the clutches of another quasi-military outfit calling itself the Silent Soldiers. It’s not clear what the Silent Soldiers want from the pair, but Banks and DJ are continually on the run from them as well as the inevitable seas of mindless but easy to kill zombies wandering pretty much everywhere.
Soldiers of Zed is non-stop action with Banks and DJ, as well as the reader, rarely able to pause to catch our breaths. At such a pace, despite the story being told in the first person (From Banks perspective), we don’t get much reflection or philosophical thought about what it all means. While we know Banks is looking for his family, we see only occasional flashes from his memories and not many emotional tugs regarding the quest.
Mostly, we get a detailed and vivid play-by-play of Banks’s actions, both the planning and then execution.
This isn’t one of those speculative fiction outings with a message or theme or warning. It’s a straight-ahead grim and often grisly roller-coaster of a ride. In the end, Soldiers of Zed is strictly for zombie fans, and there’s no shortage of such folks. I suspect their favorite words in the book will be in the title—book one. Obviously, there’s more to come and if you make it to the cliff-hanger ending, book two won’t arrive soon enough.
This review first appeared at BookPleasures.com on Nov. 5, 2017:
http://dpli.ir/09W8Mm
November 4, 2017
Book Review: The Lerewood by Andrea Churchill
The Lerewood
Andrea Churchill
Print Length: 75 pages
Publisher: Kellan Publishing (June 20, 2015)
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
ISBN: 978-1514645901
ASIN: B0104XBP1K
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0104XBP1K/...
Reviewed by Dr. Wesley Britton
Andrea Churchill’s The Lerewood is, in the main, a new fable, a new parable for modern readers. From the get-go, clearly we’re not expected to see the horrible town of Lerewood nor the haunted forest that surrounds it as plausible settings that could exist sometime, somewhere.
In this novelette, Lerewood is an isolated village filled with impoverished, starving people closer to primitive savagery than anything resembling civilized humanity. Strangely, these filthy and always angry townspeople never seem to die from disease or starvation. They don’t think there is any sort of outside world, have no idea where their town came from, and most importantly, they don’t know whether or not a glowing green-eyed creature in the woods named Ilere is real or a myth. In either case, the people live in fear of Ilere, terrified of her killing anyone who dares to go into the woods.
We meet one depressed middle-aged man named Uallas who is so tired of abuse from his more than shrewish wife that he decides to commit suicide by entering the woods. From that point forward, Uallas learns everything he was raised to believe was lies and that evil doesn’t live in the forest but instead lives in the people of Lerewood. He meets and befriends the strange, cloaked creature called Ilere before he must make choices about his future. Ilere too finds she must make hard choices as her mission isn’t the murderous crusade the unkind townspeople think.
Obviously, perhaps, this is a story full of symbolism as it explores themes like just what is the nature of evil, how can the natural world co-exist with a destructive mankind, how can we sort out physical and spiritual identity, and determine the meaning of sacrifice when balancing the fate of a world against the life of one man.
What gives this story an extra measure of readability is Churchill’s gift for moody, gloomy, and often spooky descriptive language that personifies a strange forest, its trees, its creatures, its ground and leaves. Here’s a very brief sample:
The trees seemed to get taller as he walked further along. The trees that surrounded him were covered in vines to the point where the bark could not be seen. He felt the different vines that hung before him; one tree had sticky vines, another had rotting vines, and another's vines were ashy. Nothing was barren, yet nothing was fresh and new. All the vegetation of Lerewood had some kind of murkiness to it, as if it was all infused with haunted souls or, more likely, exposed to the presence of an unnatural and evil being.
You could classify The Lerewood as YA as its readability would suit any age-range. But it’s the sort of fable that should appeal to a wider audience, especially readers who like their fantasies with a dark edge. And readers who don’t normally read fantasies should easily follow a story that reads like a yarn we all might have read long ago. But we didn’t.
This review first appeared at BookPleasures.com on Nov. 4, 2017:
http://dpli.ir/WnTiDW
Andrea Churchill
Print Length: 75 pages
Publisher: Kellan Publishing (June 20, 2015)
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
ISBN: 978-1514645901
ASIN: B0104XBP1K
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0104XBP1K/...
Reviewed by Dr. Wesley Britton
Andrea Churchill’s The Lerewood is, in the main, a new fable, a new parable for modern readers. From the get-go, clearly we’re not expected to see the horrible town of Lerewood nor the haunted forest that surrounds it as plausible settings that could exist sometime, somewhere.
In this novelette, Lerewood is an isolated village filled with impoverished, starving people closer to primitive savagery than anything resembling civilized humanity. Strangely, these filthy and always angry townspeople never seem to die from disease or starvation. They don’t think there is any sort of outside world, have no idea where their town came from, and most importantly, they don’t know whether or not a glowing green-eyed creature in the woods named Ilere is real or a myth. In either case, the people live in fear of Ilere, terrified of her killing anyone who dares to go into the woods.
We meet one depressed middle-aged man named Uallas who is so tired of abuse from his more than shrewish wife that he decides to commit suicide by entering the woods. From that point forward, Uallas learns everything he was raised to believe was lies and that evil doesn’t live in the forest but instead lives in the people of Lerewood. He meets and befriends the strange, cloaked creature called Ilere before he must make choices about his future. Ilere too finds she must make hard choices as her mission isn’t the murderous crusade the unkind townspeople think.
Obviously, perhaps, this is a story full of symbolism as it explores themes like just what is the nature of evil, how can the natural world co-exist with a destructive mankind, how can we sort out physical and spiritual identity, and determine the meaning of sacrifice when balancing the fate of a world against the life of one man.
What gives this story an extra measure of readability is Churchill’s gift for moody, gloomy, and often spooky descriptive language that personifies a strange forest, its trees, its creatures, its ground and leaves. Here’s a very brief sample:
The trees seemed to get taller as he walked further along. The trees that surrounded him were covered in vines to the point where the bark could not be seen. He felt the different vines that hung before him; one tree had sticky vines, another had rotting vines, and another's vines were ashy. Nothing was barren, yet nothing was fresh and new. All the vegetation of Lerewood had some kind of murkiness to it, as if it was all infused with haunted souls or, more likely, exposed to the presence of an unnatural and evil being.
You could classify The Lerewood as YA as its readability would suit any age-range. But it’s the sort of fable that should appeal to a wider audience, especially readers who like their fantasies with a dark edge. And readers who don’t normally read fantasies should easily follow a story that reads like a yarn we all might have read long ago. But we didn’t.
This review first appeared at BookPleasures.com on Nov. 4, 2017:
http://dpli.ir/WnTiDW
Wesley Britton's Blog
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“The Blind Alien is a story with a highly original concept, fascinating characters, and not-too-subtle but truthful allegories. Don’t let the ...more
“The Blind Alien is a story with a highly original concept, fascinating characters, and not-too-subtle but truthful allegories. Don’t let the ...more
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