Musings of a Bookworm: Reviews by Tim: Back to school is in the air all around

Review writen by: Tim

Back to school is in the air all around. Having been a student for most of twenty years and then a professor for another nineteen, I always get a feeling of renewal this time of year. It causes me to want to learn something new and experience something different. So my reading becomes … well sort of “experimental.” With that in mind, I begin to look for a new concept or an original way to handle an old concept. The search has been a bit tentative for new titles. While there are several classics that might satisfy my desire to see something unique, the later fare is less than plentiful. Still, here are a couple of reasonably good chances.

Imagine discovering everything you believe about yourself to be a lie. And that the truth could stir a killer from his lair.

Following the death of the woman she believed to be her mother, 28-year-old Naomi Waters learns from a malicious aunt that she is not only adopted, but the product of a brutal rape that left her birth mother, Mary Rose Francis, a teenager of Micmac ancestry, in a coma for 8 months.

Dealing with a sense of betrayal and loss, but with new purpose in her life, Naomi vows to track down Mary Rose's attackers and bring them to justice. She places her story in the local paper, asking for information from residents who might remember something of the case that has been cold for nearly three decades.

She is about to lose hope that her efforts will bear fruit, when she gets an anonymous phone call. Naomi has attracted the attention of one who remembers the case well.

But someone else has also read the article in the paper. The man whose DNA she carries.

And he has Naomi in his sights.

My Review

I’ll start off with a title that quite frankly surprised me. This tale begins thirty plus years in the past and introduces the reader to the title character who is pretty much only a motivation for the rest of the story. Without saying anything that might spoil this really good reading experience for you, let me tell you that it’s all here. There is a dose of paranormal, a taste of Native American folklore, a smidgeon of romance, a fair amount of suspense and a very satisfying ending. Now you might ask, how can one get all that in a single novel. Quite simply, all that’s needed is a solid storyteller, a motivated wordsmith and a vivid imagination for an author. This book has it all and more. My advice is straightforward: Read it, you’ll be pleased.

My Rating:

And then there are always those titles that surprise me in a not so positive way. Just so you don’t feel like the “Lone Ranger” when you pick a bogus title to read, rest assured that it happens to us all. The next review is a perfect example

James Benton might be the last man on earth. Racing to get to work, he finds random abandoned cars, smoldering pile-ups, and something even stranger. Everywhere he goes there's no grass, no people, not even a bird in the sky. Alone in a barren world, James travels west in search of someone, anyone who might have survived The Quiet.

My Review

Calling this title a novella is a bit presumptuous since in reality it is only a short story stretched so thin as to be transparent. The tale itself is based on a totally unimaginable scenario that would leave the neighbors and family and even the germs in the central character’s mouth dead but not the man himself. The word that jumps to mind is irrational and not in a good way. There is no character development so no opportunity exists for the reader to identify or have compassion. I find myself in the rare position of having to say that I would not recommend this title to anyone. Any reader would be far better using the two hours to read some stories by Edgar Allen Poe or to reread a few chapters of any Stephen King novel.