Book Reviews | Self-Publishing Review

Review: A Rebel’s Path (The Enchanted Isles Book 3) by I.L. Cruz

A Rebel's Path (The Enchanted Isles Book 3) by I.L. Cruz

Author I.L. Cruz summons another tense chapter of the Enchanted Isles YA series with A Rebel’s Path, her third electrifying installment. Between paternal revelations, impending royal nuptials, a resurgence of magic, and an urban legend come to life, the life of Inez Garza and the realm of Canto is as strange and exciting as ever.

Inez’s predestined fate of bringing magic back to the Enchanted Isles is a tall order, particularly since she has no idea how to achieve that seemingly impossible goal. Her powers have proven to be impressive, but difficult to predict and keep hidden, training in […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2022-10-03T17:33:55+02:00October 3rd, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews, Lead Story|Tags: Fantasy Book Reviews, YA Fantasy Book Reviews, Young Adult Book Reviews|

Review: The Kentucky Bicentennial by Dale E. Voelker

The Kentucky Bicentennial by Dale Voelker

A visual tour of Kentucky during its 200th birthday year, The Kentucky Bicentennial by Dale E. Voelker is a celebration of a state, its people, and the enduring spirit that populates every corner of the Bluegrass State. These pages hold images from events both big and small that occurred in 1992 across the state, finally brought to life thirty years later in this commemorative book.

The photos from “Hillbilly Days” are particularly evocative of the rustic, patriotic, and whimsical nature of the state, while the shots of the Kentucky Derby that year are both dynamic and intimate. The “Summer Festival […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2022-11-09T13:15:57+02:00October 2nd, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: History Book Reviews, Photography Book Reviews|

Review: Reclaiming the Sacred by Jeff Golden

Reclaiming the Sacred by Jeff Golden

With the masterful pen of a mystic scholar, Jeff Golden delivers a profound assessment of the modern world and a bold schematic for salvation in Reclaiming the Sacred: Healing Our Relationships with Ourselves and the World.

To explain the discipline of a book like this, it is perhaps easiest to use the author’s own words – “The science of happiness, abundance, and belonging.” Explaining the instability and corruptibility of today’s world, as well as the path that led us here, Golden attempts to redirect the course of society through positive adaptation and intentional shifts in our belief structures, artfully […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2022-10-31T18:37:08+02:00September 29th, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Social Science Book Reviews|

Review: Invisible Threads by Margaret Carpenter Arnett

Invisible Threads by Margaret Carpenter Arnett

Margaret Carpenter Arnett’s heartfelt memoir, Invisible Threads, is the story of a woman, a mother, and an artist that unfolds in an intimate journalistic style, embedded with dreams, poems, paintings, Bible passages, and I Ching texts – the invisible threads that stitch the artist’s tales together.

Carpenter Arnett’s story begins in 1935 in Southwick, England where she was born, quickly followed by her brother and sisters. Their sheltered childhood in idyllic rural England was soon shaken by WWII, as Carpenter Arnett recalls hiding under the stairs while the Luftwaffe roared in the sky and bombs dropped all around her. […]

SPR2022-10-28T15:42:48+02:00September 28th, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Art Book Reviews, Memoir Book Reviews|

Review: Birdie Pesky Was Here by Andrew Augustine Connor

Birdie Pesky Was Here by Andrew Augustine Connor

A spiraling account of a fictional historical heist, Birdie Pesky Was Here: The Story of the Big Bad Buxom Blonde Boston Bank Boost by Andrew Augustine Connor is a rowdy and unpredictable thriller that teeters on the edge of believable from start to finish, making it easy to forget that this novel is a wildly creative piece of imagination.

Cash and Cary make for an unforgettable duo of safe crackers as they scheme their way around their debt to a dangerous don, with a dazzling balance of laissez-faire larceny and daring deeds. They are a delightfully odd couple, and genuinely […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2022-10-10T17:29:21+02:00September 28th, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews, Lead Story|Tags: Historical Fiction Book Reviews, Thriller Book Reviews|

Review: One Last Song For My Father by Edwin Fontánez

An elegant elegy for an imperfect man, Edwin Fontánez’s One Last Song For My Father: A Son’s Memoir is a gorgeous blend of alliterative prose, lyrical poetry, and lush metaphoric writing.

Growing up in Puerto Rico, author Fontánez always struggled with his often neglectful and financially irresponsible father, Modesto. A tinsmith metalworker who dropped out of school before the third grade, Modesto enjoyed playing music with friends in his spare time, but his alcoholism left his family in a constant state of impoverishment. Fontánez resented his father’s lack of empathy, particularly for his mother, but his dad did have a […]

Michelle Hogmire2022-10-27T16:56:23+02:00September 23rd, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Biography Book Reviews, Memoir Book Reviews|

Review: Hunted by LaBrie James

Hunted by LaBrie James

Author LaBrie James plunges readers into a tangled nightmare in her gripping debut novel, Hunted, a character-driven dive into dark family drama and deadly small-town secrets.

Stalked by a vengeful shadow, one with a face eerily resembling the chief of police, Lennox Rose is slowly recovering from a gunshot wound sustained during a horrific attack, but that brutal night in the snow is only the beginning. After watching her best friend violated and killed, Lennox is shattered both physically and mentally, and has to somehow find a way to rebuild herself.

Finn Holland is the young officer assigned to […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2022-09-30T09:44:47+02:00September 22nd, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews, Lead Story|Tags: Thriller Book Reviews|

Review: The Happy Valley by Benjamin Harnett

The Happy Valley by Benjamin Harnett

The Happy Valley by Benjamin Harnett is an innovative and genre-bending work that reveals startling truths about an idyllic rural community in upstate New York.

Separated into two parts – “The Farm” and “The Key” – an unnamed narrator embarks on a journey to find June, his ex-lover who has disappeared. Moving back and forth between the historical and more recent pasts (the 1800s, the 1990s) and a futuristic present (2036 and beyond), the novel is part historical novel, part science/speculative fiction, and part self-reflexive meta-fiction.

In “The Farm,” our narrator recalls junior high, where he first met and fell […]

SPR2022-10-17T16:01:09+02:00September 19th, 2022|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Speculative Fiction Book Reviews|