On this turkey-filled day full of thanks and gratitude, I would like to express just how much I appreciate that you are willing to hang out as often as you do with me here.
Yours truly is one grateful turkey, that’s for sure.
And as a means of expressing my gratitude to you for hanging out here with me, I come bearing gifts…
Continue reading “Giving Season Giveaway”BOOK | FICTION | SHORT STORIES
A GATHERING OF BUTTERFLIES by Sean C. Wright
RATING: ★ ★ ★ ★
Continue reading “A GATHERING OF BUTTERFLIES by Sean C. Wright – A Review”Tales of steely but vulnerable women of color will melt your heart while lifting your spirits…
Book Description from Amazon
A fierce grandmother keeps her grandson from the clutches of Old Scratch in Devil Does Dallas.
An alien abduction transforms a large, miserable woman in Hazel Hogan.
A country girl meets a city girl on her birthday, and struggles to decide if the girl’s heart is dark or light in Bubble Bath Twelve.
And methodical Genie forms an unlikely relationship in Heaven’s Halfway House while in a coma.
I would like to sincerely thank Ms. Gina Rae Mitchell for taking the time to read The Good Kill and write such a fantastic review for it.
I could tell when first visiting Gina’s website packed full of book reviews, author interviews, and all kinds of other interesting information from gardening tips to tasty recipes that hers was a platform I would love to get my book profiled on. So, as you can imagine, I was very grateful when she responded in the affirmative to my review request.
Continue reading “THE GOOD KILL – A Review by Gina Rae Mitchell”Two of my favorite reviewers are Pulitzer Prize-winning literary critics Michael Dirda of the Washington Post and the great Michiko Kakutani, formerly of the New York Times. Both can lay out a review in ways that break a book down for a reader in interesting and informative ways without simply making it seem as if they are listing out a series bullet points… like many reviewers tend to do. And both can bring you to an understanding of the work being reviewed – what they like about it, what they don’t – with always just the right tone deserving of it. Mostly both are modest and balanced in their well-informed and well-referenced literary assessments; however, if the book calls for a fight, they can take it down to the mat as fast and as hard as any crazy-eyed pile-driving WWE champion ever could. Ms. Kakutani was especially known for her fearlessness – and ruthlessness – when taking on the bad writing of popular(ly pretentious) authors.
*cough, Franzen, cough cough
Fortunately, Mr. Dirda is still working his beat for the Post.
Unfortunately, Ms. Kakutani, after a stellar and storied career, retired from the Times a couple of years ago… right around the time of President The Donald’s election come to think about it.
When I learned of her retirement it actually made me sad.
But guess what.
I think I may have found a worthy replacement for Ms. Kakutani as one of my top go to reviewers…
That would be Ms. Kitty Marie of Kitty Marie’s Reading Corner.
That’s right, check out her review of my book, of which is reblogged down below for your entertainment and instruction, and then check out all of her many other interesting, informative, and tightly structured reviews posted to her website, and try to tell me you don’t agree with me that her reviews are some of the best there are.
Yeah…
Thank you Kitty for all the time and care you invested in reading and reviewing, not just my book, but all the others as well. You, and all the reviewers out there like you doing it simply for the love and admiration of the written word, provide an immensely valuable service for the entire literary community.
Write on!
The Good Kill: A Killian Lebon Novel (Amazon Link)
Author : Kurt Brindley
Published By : PROSOCHE
Year Published : 2019
Genre / Tags : Action, Suspense, Adult Fiction, Dark Fiction
Mood : Gritty, yet having the feel of an action flick.
Formats : Paperback, eBook
# of Pages : 404 pages (Hardcover)
Summary
A former Navy SEAL turned vigilante hitman already in the crosshairs of corrupt Russian agents finds himself in even deeper trouble after rescuing a sex trafficking victim against her will just as she is about to be delivered into the hands of an unscrupulous corporate mogul, an impetuous and dangerous man who will not be denied his purchase. . .
Review
Content Warnings : Violence, torture, gore. A victim of sexual assault goes into heavy detail of her experiences on one scene late into the book. Coercion and rape, drug use.
Note : I received a…
View original post 892 more words
BOOK | FICTION | HUMOR
THE TELEPORTER
LEE HALL
RATING: ★ ★ ★ ★
Continue reading “THE TELEPORTER by Lee Hall – A Review”What if there was a power like no other? What if one drunken slouch happened to stumble where nobody has stumbled before and discovered the ability to teleport!
Publisher’s Book Description
Just when you thought there were enough super hero stories in this world, we made another one…
Kurt Wiseman is your average mid-twenties slouch with a serial thirst for alcohol, that is until destiny calls upon him to stumble where no man has clumsily stumbled before. By day he works for a familiar sounding, power hungry, media controlling, mega rich American businessman who represents everything wrong with society today. Whilst investigating this politically loaded story arc Kurt accidentally acquires a super power like no other. The ability to teleport!
Before he can think about saving the day, Wiseman must endure a journey of self-reflection by earning the trust of his friends and overcoming his greatest weakness, booze. Even if the path is filled with comic book cliché, inappropriate one liners and genre busting fourth wall action.
Not all heroes in this world are the same and with great power comes the possibility to go viral! This is a story that will unite humanity…
Kurt Wiseman is the Teleporter!
If you were to have asked me as recently as a couple of months ago just before I released my latest novel what the state of the literary union was like, I would have answered most assuredly that it was in a sad and rapid state of decline.
However, after spending the past couple of months hustling daily in search of reviews for my book, I have come to realize just how vast and seemingly growing the union actually is.
I am wholly amazed and completely impressed by how active… nay, not just active, but how enthusiastically aggressive this wondrous and brightly beaming ecosystem of book readers and reviewers actually is.
And as I daily seek out new reviewers to pester with my requests by scrolling through the WordPress “book-reviews” tag, it seems that the list of reviewers that the tag calls forth is more than just a defined ecosystem of readers, it seems as if I am scrolling through an infinite universe of literary lovers of the highest order…
Literary lovers who I find, unsurprisingly, to be mostly young women.
Young women such as book enthusiast and prolific reviewer Meg Orton.
I strongly invite you to check out not just Ms. Orton’s deeply penetrating and intellectually engaging website review of my book, which I’ve reblogged here for your entertainment and instruction, but also her Instagram site where she is a popular bookstagram reviewer and photographer.
Thank you Meg, both for reviewing my book with such thoroughness and intellectual vigor, and for giving me the grateful understanding and joy that our literary future is in goods hands… and even better minds.
BOOK REVIEW:
Title: The Good Kill
Author: Kurt Brindley
Date published: 2019
Published/printed by: Prosoche
Star rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
{I was graciously sent this novel by the author himself in exchange for an honest review}
What is a ‘good kill’? What is so poignant to this story is making sure that you DO NOT (I repeat: DO NOT) make a clear distinction between wrong and right. Ever since I can remember I have always believed in the shades of grey that exist within, as well as outside the realm of good and evil, and in order to understand our hero, or ‘anti-hero’ we must accept that these particular characters exist. In Kurt Brindley’s novel our protagonist and our ‘anti-hero’ is Killian Lebon, a former Navy Seal whose experiences in Iraq have left him both severally injured physically and psychologically traumatized. Medically retired from the Navy Killian must now attempt to exist…
View original post 739 more words
I’ve sent out many review request emails since I’ve published The Good Kill and after emailing one to Ms. Peyton Hammond the other day, I had just assumed, like most other requests, it would be a hit or miss whether it would get answered or not… mostly not as I’ve come to find out. As you can imagine if you’re an author in constant (desperate?) search of reviewers as I am, I was very surprised when I received a response from her that same day graciously informing me that she would review the book. That almost never happens. But then she surprised me again by telling me she would have the review up within a week. That never happens and I honestly, while thankful for the intent, was a bit skeptical. But I’ll be darned if she didn’t surprise me one last time by actually having the review posted within the week as advertised.
How cool is that?
Dry ice cold, that’s how cool it is.
I am a slow reader, almost as slow as I am as a writer, and I am so very envious of Peyton and others like her who posses the gift of not only being able to read a book all lickity split-like, but also being able to comprehend what has been read so quickly and then write about it in interesting ways that inform others as to why the book should or should not be read.
It truly is a gift, as it would take a month, at least, for me to read a book the size of my excessively wordy beast. And then to put a review together for it… it wouldn’t happen in a matter of days, that’s for sure.
Anyway, enough about my literary lameness and back to how very impressed I am with Peyton’s industriousness and the high quality of reviews that she so regularly posts to her well-kept, well-regarded, and interesting site, a site in which I recommend to you and all other book lovers like you most highly.
Thank you, Peyton!
Title: The Good Kill: A Killian Lebon Novel
Author: Kurt Brindley
Number of Pages: 404 pages
Publisher: Prosoche
Publication Date: May 1, 2019
Purchase: Amazon
My Rating: 4.5/5 stars
Synopsis from Goodreads:
A former Navy SEAL turned vigilante hitman already in the crosshairs of corrupt Russian agents finds himself in even deeper trouble after rescuing a sex trafficking victim against her will just as she is about to be delivered into the hands of an unscrupulous corporate mogul, an impetuous and dangerous man who will not be denied his purchase. . .
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
During the battle to liberate Mosul from the brutal grip of the Islamic State, Killian Lebon, a war-weary Navy SEAL Senior Chief, sustains life-threatening injuries from an explosion during a rescue operation that goes horribly wrong.
Forced into early retirement from a vocation that for almost twenty years had been his sole purpose…
View original post 462 more words
BOOK | FICTION | LITERARY
THE DEVIL ALL THE TIME
DONALD RAY POLLOCK
AUDIOBOOK
RATING: ★ ★ ★ ★★
Continue reading “THE DEVIL ALL THE TIME by Donald Ray Pollock – A Review”Set in rural southern Ohio and West Virginia, The Devil All the Time follows a cast of compelling and bizarre characters from the end of World War II to the 1960s. There’s Willard Russell, tormented veteran of the carnage in the South Pacific, who can’t save his beautiful wife, Charlotte, from an agonizing death by cancer no matter how much sacrificial blood he pours on his “prayer log.” There’s Carl and Sandy Henderson, a husband-and-wife team of serial killers, who troll America’s highways searching for suitable models to photograph and exterminate. There’s the spider-handling preacher Roy and his crippled virtuoso-guitar-playing sidekick, Theodore, running from the law. And caught in the middle of all this is Arvin Eugene Russell, Willard and Charlotte’s orphaned son, who grows up to be a good but also violent man in his own right.
From the Book Description
When Imani Amour (cool name) requested a copy of my book during my summer giveaway, I first went snooping around her site before responding to see what her literary interests and writing chops were like. The first page I hit was her about page and I immediately became concerned when discovering that according to it she was still in high school. My book covers some very mature themes, many of which are potential triggers, so I thought that perhaps she wasn’t yet ready for it. However, after reading through several of her well-written and compelling posts, I realized that despite what her about page said regarding her age, she was very mature intellectually… probably more so than yours truly.
Fortunately, the arbitrary age thing was a non-issue because I learned after chatting with her that she was already in college and just hadn’t had the time yet to update her about page.
Lucky for me because I am now graced with a powerful and informative critique of my work and I would like to thank Ms. Amour for investing so much of her time and talent into it. I strongly recommend that you first, read the review of course, then continue on to read more of the many interesting pieces that she has posted to her site. You’ll be happy you did, believe me.
Now excuse me while I go and hunt me down some various typos…
Today there’s an undertone of social injustices plaguing our world with a threatening yet taboo sense of doom that seems unspeakable by most. Discussions on suicide, PTSD and human trafficking have either seemed hushed or handled controversially…that is, until Kurt Brindley came along. His novel, The Good Kill is an emblem of progress for all those who dare rise up against the enslaving silence in our society in hopes of sparking change. Brindley harnesses these frightening topics by the reigns and skillfully tames them into a narrative where readers can discuss, comprehend and conquer these social demons. Equally riveting as it is revealing, The Good Kill exposes the love and logic behind hateful underground crimes that we witness today; it is a story about innocent youth, broken military vigilantes and even senile pastors learning how to fight for the family, friendships, “God and Country” that they believe in.
To list…
View original post 461 more words
BOOK | FICTION | LITERARY
THE DISTANT SOUND OF VIOLENCE
JASON GREENSIDES
RATING: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Do we ever escape the decisions we make when we’re fifteen?
Amazon Book Description
Nathan Dawes, the loser from school, an outsider, street philosopher and member of The Grove Runners gang, needs Ryan’s help to get Stephanie to fall for him. When Ryan’s lawnmower is stolen, Nathan sees this as his chance to enlist Ryan in his plan.
Although Ryan knows becoming friends with Nathan could lead to trouble, he reluctantly agrees to help.
Stephanie wants nothing to do with either of them. Besides, she’s more interested in the one guy in the world she really shouldn’t be.
As Nathan continues his pursuit of Stephanie, and Ryan gets mixed up with The Grove Runners, soon events overtake them all, haunting their lives for years to come.
Part coming of age, part mystery story, The Distant Sound of Violence is a heartbreaking tale of bad decisions and love gone wrong. It’s about choices that lead to violence, loss and tragedy.
BOOK | FICTION | HORROR
THE LESSER DEAD
CHRISTOPHER BUEHLMAN
AUDIOBOOK
RATING: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Continue reading “THE LESSER DEAD by Christopher Buehlman — A Review”The secret is, vampires are real and I am one.
Amazon Book Description
The secret is, I’m stealing from you what is most truly yours and I’m not sorry…
New York City in 1978 is a dirty, dangerous place to live. And die. Joey Peacock knows this as well as anybody—he has spent the last forty years as an adolescent vampire, perfecting the routine he now enjoys: womanizing in punk clubs and discotheques, feeding by night, and sleeping by day with others of his kind in the macabre labyrinth under the city’s sidewalks.
The subways are his playground and his highway, shuttling him throughout Manhattan to bleed the unsuspecting in the Sheep Meadow of Central Park or in the backseats of Checker cabs, or even those in their own apartments who are too hypnotized by sitcoms to notice him opening their windows. It’s almost too easy.
Until one night he sees them hunting on his beloved subway. The children with the merry eyes. Vampires, like him…or not like him. Whatever they are, whatever their appearance means, the undead in the tunnels of Manhattan are not as safe as they once were.
And neither are the rest of us.
Many thanks to Lee Hall for reviewing my latest novel THE GOOD KILL. It’s such an honor and so very rewarding when someone like Lee gets your work.
You really need to learn more about Lee if you are just now being introduced to him. He is not only the creator of fine, independent literature himself, he is also one of its biggest supporters with his willingness to focus so much of his time and effort in reading and prolifically reviewing the work of so many other independent authors, authors who I am sure are just as grateful to Lee as yours truly right here is.
Kurt Brindley has constructed an intricate story that immediately immerses readers into the brutal world of organised crime, drug and sex trafficking and a gangster underworld all of which is centered around main character Killian Lebon. This warrior and former navy seal embarks on a journey in search of answers and revenge while also dealing with a huge level of trauma. He’s a character that for all of his flaws and even dark moments you cannot help but admire and get behind.
The story unfolds gradually via a gripping and very readable style with the emphasis on Brindley’s descriptive full sentences (proper sentences, how I have longed for thee…) with a series of stories and characters that all eventually find themselves linked later on. There are a wealth of three dimensional realistic characters…
View original post 171 more words
For years my barely read first novel INSIDE THE SKIN (formerly The Sea Trials of an Unfortunate Sailor) had been pegged at 15 meager but oh so appreciated and loved Amazon reader reviews…
However, as of today there are now only 7.
I mean, c’mon…
Thanks Amazon.
Sigh…
#itainteasythiswritinggig
