by Jim Bates Rating: **** Science fiction/dystopian mash-up The Defectives  is set in the 27 th  century. Cockroach-esque creatures, the Tracliodytes conquered Earth in the 22 nd  Century, and humans were driven underground to live in cities deep beneath the Earth’s surface. Over the next five hundred years, they segregated into the “ Rich and Powerful ” and the “ Defectives ”, and life for the latter is brutal under the diktats of the Supreme Commander, Reginald Botta. When

by Robert Wilson Rating: **** Told in four parts over the course of the 1970s, The Love You Take  is a late coming-of-age novel focusing primarily on Andy Watson, from small-town Strasburg in Virginia as he matures from college student to married father. Surrounded by a select group of eclectic friends, all of whom have their vulnerabilities and moments of self-reckoning, Andy navigates the decade of Nixon, Vietnam, and socio-political unrest while wrestling with the responsi

by Lagnard Benz Rating: **** Don’t Study at University is a self-help book with a difference, offering much more than the title suggests, covering extensive, often esoteric ground. Benz essentially lays out a manifesto, backed by personal experience and thorough research, that scrutinizes traditional educational methods and, consequently, expected career/life trajectories. He rigorously questions and, in many cases, debunks prescribed belief systems, urging the reader to do l

by Adam Cosco Rating: **** Twelve-year-old Leslie Adams feels something is wrong with her, inside, but her dad insists she’s just sleepwalking. But she isn’t sleepwalking when Leslie slashes Tommy Spence to death at his own birthday party, although she cannot remember the attack. Six years later, Leslie tries to make a new beginning, enrolling at college to study investigative journalism, although Tommy’s murder haunts her.  When she starts to experience disturbing incidents

by Julio Fernandez Rating: **** Beginning in 2012 but rapidly taking the reader up to the present day, PopeLeo.ai and The God You Trained  delivers an uncomfortable sermon on the rise of AI, chiefly through the lens of Gabriel Menas, an AI engineer who had studied to become a priest but left the seminary shortly before ordination. The novel is also inspired by the cautionary remarks concerning artificial intelligence made by Pope Leo XIV, which were included in a Vatican pres

by Doug Owen Rating: **** In 2007, after several challenging months, Doug Owen, his wife Claudia, and their young daughters, Beth and Allison, moved to an ordinary, 1950s-style white ranch house in Nampa, Idaho, hopeful the relocation would signal a fresh start for the family. It does herald a new beginning, but not the one Doug was envisaging. The Unholy Silence  is his disturbing chronicle of exactly what occurred within that house, the manifestations, malignancy,  and demo

by Stephen M. Murphy Rating: **** When Judge Ferdinand “Ferd” Pitt realizes the disheveled defendant standing in front of him is the father who abandoned Ferd and his twin sister, Claire, over thirty years ago, he immediately recuses himself from the case.  Dwight Pitt is accused of murder, and the victim is Patrick Brady, founder and Chief Technology Officer of a software development company. Brady also happened to be Ferd’s son, Josh’s boss. When evidence not only places Dw

Edited by Donald K. Hartman Rating: **** In this absorbing collection, Hartman has gathered together twelve short stories and two novelettes whose primary theme and characters are female hypnotists and/or mesmerists. The tales move between genres but broadly encompass thriller, horror, and mystery, all with elements of the supernatural or the unexplained, and are often driven by revenge or passion. Having read two of Hartman’s previous compilations * , which are variations on

by Jim Bates Rating: **** When time-traveling healer Torak is sent to the realm of Anon to treat the victims of a plague, he hopes this task will help him overcome the profound crisis of confidence he is experiencing after failing to stem a pandemic in the 21st Century during his previous assignment. What and who he finds in Anon begin to set him on the path to redemption, but when he is called upon to heal the brutal, psychopathic despot King Zorandon, Torak finds himself no

by Emily Leung Rating: **** When Krone Airways Flight KA1530 from Copenhagen lands at Heathrow with all passengers and cabin crew dead, the finger of suspicion begins to point at flight attendant, Beatriz Sarmento. But why would such a dedicated member of the cabin crew commit such an atrocity, and what does the sigil written on the cockpit door mean?... Rewind six months. Beatriz can’t wait to take to the skies again and make her mother in Faro proud after being made redunda

by Kathryn Amurra Rating: **** When Erin Dovetree’s grandmother, Rose, mentions her new landlord, Will Abbott, to Erin, she is clearly trying to matchmake. Amused but not interested, Erin dismisses the ploy. However, when she meets the handsome, enigmatic Will, their attraction to each other is immediate. Both fight against their growing feelings, but for different reasons. Erin has unresolved trust issues, and Will happens to be nearly one hundred and seventy years old, curs

by Adam Cosco Rating: **** Barbara and Teddy O’Brien desperately want to believe their daughter, Ava, an anxious, watchful eleven-year-old, when she breaks down and describes an alarming incident that occurred during the school day with her classmates.   With no proof and unreliable witnesses, Barbara, along with almost everyone else, is inclined to dismiss Ava’s bizarre account of rituals and masked figures as a product of her daughter’s overwrought, febrile imagination, but

by Emilia Rosa Rating: **** Finding Cristina: Treasures on Earth  is the third installment in Rosa’s Finding Cristina  series *. It’s 1933, Cristina is thirty and now has three children with husband, Robert. Together with their extended, blended family members, they’ve relocated to an idyllic smallholding in southern Brazil, the land of the Gaúchos .    However, Cristina’s charmingly rustic existence begins to be threatened by unexplained acts of sabotage, revenge missions,

by Christy J. Breedlove Rating: **** Desperate to escape their bleak existence in Cloud’s Rest , a dystopian city built in the sky and governed by oppression, four teenagers escape to the ground below, an unrecognizable landscape ravaged centuries earlier by an earthquake and consequent tsunamis. The four hope to find sanctuary with a community of like-minded individuals rumored to reside in the devastated environment, but instead, they encounter vicious, mutated animals and

by Cecelia Tichi Rating: **** When a Newport society picnic hosted by their normally charming friend, Theo Bulkeley, takes a strange turn and Theo disappears, Val and Roddy DeVere don’t hesitate to meet him in New York as requested. Theo is a broken man and begs for the DeVeres’ help. He is convinced that his cousin Phoebe’s Irish butler, Anson Burke, is planning to murder her, just as Theo is confident Burke killed her twin sister, Judith, a year earlier. Val has doubts abou

by Gail Ward Olmsted Rating: **** Sassy, whip-smart legal aid attorney Miranda Quinn is back for a third installment * in Olmsted’s Miranda Fights  which finds her juggling family life with counseling at-risk, troubled young women, some of whom seem to be disappearing… Meanwhile, Lennon Gallagher, the daughter of an old, estranged high-school friend, turns to her for help with a minor misdemeanor. Miranda is intrigued and does not hesitate to represent her. When Lennon expre

by Elizabeth Chater Rating: **** Beginning in 1988, Centering  unfolds the story of Alexandria “Alixe” Blair, a young, gifted ballerina whose promising career is sabotaged as she dances her first solo with The Imperial Ballet School in London and forces Alixe to end her intense romance with principal dancer, Marc Dumont. Alixe returns to California to heal. She dances for The Manhattan Ballet Company before joining the world-renowned teacher Madame Irina Karlova at her Grand

by Joyce V. Harrison Rating: **** What Now?  is a nicely calibrated collection of eight stories that broadly deal with the consequences of unforeseen events and their wider impact on characters’ lives. These incidents tend to serve as catalysts for change or self-examination, not always in a positive manner. The collection opens with Loot , which introduces Ella-Mae, a sixty-something waitress who makes an intriguing discovery whilst walking her dog, Ralphie. It begins in a j

by Emily Bleeker Rating: **** When We Chased the Light  is the follow-up to When We Were Enemies , but it capably reads as a standalone novel. It’s 1943 and Vivian Snow is about to embark on her stratospheric rise to becoming Hollywood’s darling. But her winsome public persona and glittering lifestyle hide a private life full of poor, rash decisions, driven by a fearful desperation to bury the past and the events that ended her first marriage… The story opens and closes in 20

by Chris Leite Rating: **** Mr. Portis Strawberry harbors dreams of becoming a famous director but instead works as a low-grade math teacher. Late one Friday night in Brooklyn, he finds himself inexplicably drawn to a strange cinema featuring the opening night of a film that promises to be box-office gold.  It's a film that he supposedly made. The thing is, Mr. Portis did write and plan the film, nineteen years ago … so who exactly is the Mr. Portis Strawberry who has brought