John Staughton, Senior Reviewer

Author Kaitie Howie delivers a visceral story of growing past pain and learning to love in Broken Like Me, a work of fiction that reads like a gripping memoir. A young mother with deep trust issues spirals into romance with a mysterious stranger who has heavy baggage of his own, leading to a tense, emotional minefield of a read. The flow of the story is smooth, but there are also some odd descriptive and narrative choices, including parenthetical asides and a frequent tendency to tell, rather than show. An experienced editorial pen could eliminate these inconsistencies, but overall this […]

D.K. Dailey launches a thrilling new saga set in the Golden Dreg World universe with Golden Dreg Quake: Baby Box Assassin. In the lead-up to a world-changing quake, a young assassin awakes with a missing three weeks in her memory and a mystery to solve, provided she isn’t wiped off the map by her own crew of deadly assassins first. Drawing from the rich landscape of Dailey’s ever-swelling sci-fi realm, this prequel pulses with excitement, driven by a dauntless new protagonist in Ari. Boasting rough-edged, conversational prose and a tangled plot of deceitful allies and surprising villains, Dailey elevates the […]

Creating a twisted mirror of the wealth inequality that plagues our modern world, Golden Dreg Army Book 1: Enlisted by D.K. Dailey is a thrilling YA adventure, and a worrisome prophecy for the future. Following a world quake, humanity’s dream is to create a society that can withstand anything, but that idealistic vision doesn’t take long to corrode into a vast chasm between the Goldens and the Dregs – the rich and the poor. Peppered with creative details that make this dystopic future feel three-dimensional and all too possible, the story is gripping from the start. The writing is strong, […]

Touching on the timeless battle between blood and loyalty, Return to Cursed Canyon by Samuel Ludke is an emotional, action-packed glimpse into the contentious past. A young Native American boy embarks on an identity-shaping journey through grief and growth, trying desperately to reckon with a life torn between two warring worlds. Pulling readers back to the 19th century, and the uncertain aftermath of the Civil War, this sensitively penned, character-driven novel is a stirring American reflection and a powerful reminder that the lessons of history echo in every generation.

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Zan Safra plunges readers back in time to a golden age of mystery and monsters with Children of the Night, a harrowing but immersively entertaining work of YA historical horror. Safra captures a gothic atmosphere remarkably well, adding to the mythology for some of literature’s most iconic creatures, while weaving a gripping story of friendship, duty, and determination – even to save those who may see you as a monster. At times, the prose is choppy, and the first-person perspective keeps the descriptions and narration somewhat limited, but this memorable novel is enveloping – dark and ominous, while still reading […]