Lead Story | Self-Publishing Review

Review: Rainbow Gardens by James Malone ★★★★

Rainbow Gardens, a fantasy novel set in WWII mixing troll lore with gory action and a dreamy tale of redemption and forgiveness in this epic story from debut writer James Malone.

The trolls, imagining themselves The Descendants of Cain, are searching for the truth about their origins, searching for their redeemer to come and save them from their own terrible legacy.

Harry Shikita, a Japanese American, is building Rainbow Gardens over years, a motorist’s dream resort. He could be the one, the trolls think he is. But when Pearl Harbor strikes, Harry is taken into custody, and his life is […]

Naka Jackson2015-03-02T02:23:51+02:00March 2nd, 2015|Categories: Lead Story|Tags: Fantasy Book Reviews|

Review: This Book Belongs To by Daley James Francis ★★★★

A nine-year-old girl. A magical sketchbook. A huge imagination. A lot of trouble.

When men in hardhats arrive at Amy Carr’s house, she’s old enough to understand that this isn’t a social call. They are there to knock down her house. In the ruins, Amy unearths an old sketchbook. Soon she learns that this isn’t an ordinary sketchbook.

The creatures she draws in this magical sketchbook come alive. The premise behind this book is fun and just as creative as Amy’s imagination in the story. Most middle grade readers are still focused inward and aren’t very aware of the outside […]

T B Markinson2016-07-29T05:15:55+02:00February 3rd, 2015|Categories: Book Reviews, Lead Story|Tags: Children's Book Reviews, Young Adult Book Reviews|

Review: Trapped in Time by Clay Brandenburg

Trapped in Time, by Clay Brandenburg, is a page-turning time travel novel that transports the reader to 1944 in Nazi Germany.

In 2013, John Cleary, a high school history teacher, is trying to put his life back together. His wife was killed in a car accident. During a camping trip with two of his childhood friends, John is caught in the midst of a meteorological phenomenon that mysteriously transports him to wartorn Germany. He’s trapped in 1944.

Klara Bock, a widow, lives alone on a rural farm. Her only companion is her dachshund, Bratwurst. Klara’s father didn’t support the […]

T B Markinson2015-02-02T09:02:48+02:00January 27th, 2015|Categories: Lead Story|Tags: Historical Fiction Book Reviews, Science Fiction Book Reviews|

Review: Defensive Magic by Kate Baray

Defensive Magic Urban fantasy romance novel Defensive Magic is the third book in the Lost Library series by Kate Baray, but is cleverly written to be a standalone adventure with an established cast of exciting and loveable supernaturally-charged characters.

Giving the classic werewolf theme a reboot, Baray crafts a rock-and-rolling tale, as John Braxton, of the Lycan persuasion, has his place as the Texas Alpha in his Pack challenged after he returns from Europe to his homeland with Lizzie Smith in tow, his mortal lover, known as his mate, who must now keep up in her parallel existence in the ‘real world’ […]

Cate Baum2015-02-02T08:56:37+02:00January 26th, 2015|Categories: Lead Story|Tags: Fantasy Book Reviews, Urban Fantasy Book Reviews|

Review: The House on Sunset by Sarafina Bianco

Contains brief scenes of rape and forced drug use.

Some books demand to be written. This is one. And it also demands to be read. Ignoring domestic abuse cannot go on. Authors like Sarafina Bianco are sounding the alarm and we should listen. Heeding the alarm isn’t always easy because it forces people out of their comfort zone. The House on Sunset does just that.

Sarafina was a high school English teacher. She had recently purchased a new home, which was an accomplishment she was proud of. Not everything was going well, though. Her boyfriend of a year and half […]

T B Markinson2015-02-02T08:59:57+02:00January 15th, 2015|Categories: Lead Story|Tags: Memoir Book Reviews|

Review: The Alcatraz Rose by Anthony Eglin

alcatraz rose The Alcatraz Rose: A Lawrence Kingston Mystery by Anthony Eglin is a cozy mystery that sticks with the reader well after finishing.

When Lawrence Kingston is approached by a thirteen-year-old child, who wants him to look into her mother’s disappearance, he has no idea what he’s about to get into. The case has been unsolved for eight years. Then another mystery falls into his lap when he learns that an English rose thought to be extinct has been sighted on Alcatraz Island. How did the rose travel 5,000 miles and end up outside one of America’s most notorious prisons?

During […]

T B Markinson2020-12-23T05:54:32+02:00January 14th, 2015|Categories: Lead Story|Tags: Crime Fiction Book Reviews, Mystery Book Reviews|

Review: Keeper Chronicles: Awakening by Katherine Wynter

Awakening Urban fantasy Keeper Chronicles: Awakening by Katherine Wynter is a fantastic adventure with demonic activity, romance and psychic powers all wrapped up in the beauty and magic of a lighthouse seascape.

Author Wynter brings alive the setting from the first page. Readers will be able to taste the salty waves as they crash into the powerful lighthouse at Cape Creek Bridge as lightning strikes. Rebekah is our protagonist, but there are a number of other female players, all with strong personalities from the off. Rebekah is a hardy and rounded heroine that will carry with the reader during her turmoil […]

Cate Baum2015-02-02T09:11:59+02:00January 7th, 2015|Categories: Lead Story|Tags: Fantasy Book Reviews|

Review: The Arrow by Maureen O’Leary

The Arrow by Maureen O'Leary Based on an old Gaelic myth, The Arrow is about Fynn Kildare, one of two daughters of Saint Brigid, a “Divine” goddess with miraculous powers of healing. As a teenager, Fynn lived with her family on a centuries-old fortress of Brigid’s Keep, out in the ocean, off the coast of the town of St. Cocha, using her healing magic on the sick and weary who were able to travel to them. When a patient turned out to be a trap set by a witch, Fynn realized and – too late to draw back – becomes infected with a demon virus […]