Review: Never Too Far

Never Too Far by Abbi Glines

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



A terrific follow up to Falling Too Far. The story of Rush and Blair continues and this book explores the damage lies and a lack of trust, even when the lies are lies of omission, even lies of omission meant to protect one from hurt, can do to a relationship. There is so much I cannot talk about without giving important plot points away though. Let me just say the sex is steamy, the story powerful, and though the story wraps up beautifully it leaves one wanting to know about the future of these characters.

As much as I've loved so many other Glines books, her Low is my #2 ever book crush, I think with each book she gets better at her craft. I wonder how much longer than can continue because she is already so darn good at spinning a compelling and unforgettable story filled with rounded and believable characters.



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Review: Double Play at Short

Double Play at Short by Matt Christopher

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



I'm having a hard time deciding how to rate this. I'm looking for books for a friend for their young son who is not a big fan of reading but loves sports. I checked this one out. A good story but sometimes the long description, inning by inning of baseball games gets in the way of the narrative. On the other hand I suspect those descriptions will be exactly what draws in the young man in question who is sports obsessed, especially baseball.

Underneath the baseball is a sad story just barely explored, but enough for the age group. One could make a great YA book out of this story-line I would think if you advanced the age of the protagonists a few years.



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Review: The Summer I Learned to Dive

The Summer I Learned to Dive by Shannon McCrimmon

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



4.5 stars. I really enjoyed this book, wonderful characters, a compelling story. Watching people grow and change in realistic ways. A self-contained story but obviously ripe for a sequel, which I just bought. LOL

A different spin on coming of age than I have read. It only missed 5 stars in my eyes because it didn't have quite the pop of a [a:Nyrae Dawn|5784345|Nyrae Dawn|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1354150152p2/5784345.jpg] or [a:Colleen Hoover|5430144|Colleen Hoover|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1333056335p2/5430144.jpg] or some others. As a first book though I am very impressed and as I said, as soon as I tweeted I had finished it I bought the next book from my Kindle. That pretty much says it all.



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Review: Flyaway

Flyaway by Helen Landalf

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



I'm giving this one 3.5, wasn't quite a 4 star book, but was certainly more than a 3.

A sad story of a young girl dealing with a mother who has a lot of problems of her own. I can't go too far into it without giving away serious plot points. As I finished it, I was not real happy with the end, but after thinking for a few moments I decided it was real, and right.

My biggest suggestions to the author would be develop your characters a little more. The female MC was quite well done, her mom a little less, and then down the line. The male characters were mostly just empty shells with a few interesting things knwon about them, but none of them ever developed. I'd suggest that Ms Landalf read some [a:Nyrae Dawn|5784345|Nyrae Dawn|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1354150152p2/5784345.jpg] to see how a master at writing male characters does it.



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ABC's Nightline gets it completely wrong on New Adult Fiction!

  Tonight I watched ABC's Nightline and frankly it pissed me off.  They did a feature on New Adult fiction featuring Colleen Hoover.  They referred to her book Slammed, and the whole genre as "smut."  they kept comparing her books, and Jamie McGuire's, and the rest of the emerging NA glitterati to that drek 50 Shades of Grey, which was poorly written smut IMHO.  I've left comments on their page, and let them know how disappointed I was by a show that is usually journalistic ethically  excellent would talk about books obviously not a single person on their staff had ever read.

  I challenge people to read books by authors like Colleen Hoover, Jamie McGuire, Jessica Park, Nyrae Dawn, Steph Campbell, Jolene Perry or Liz Reinherdt and see if they consider ANY of it smut.

  Great stories about love and loss, coming of age, finding yourself and healing after trauma, even those that contain some erotic parts (as does life itself I might note!) are NOT smut.

From the free online dictionary

Smut:  A: Obscenity in speech or print
           B: pornography

Review: Girl Meets Boy: Because There Are Two Sides to Every Story

Girl Meets Boy: Because There Are Two Sides to Every Story by Kelly Milner Halls

My rating: 2 of 5 stars



This look really good, but I was left disappointed. I normally like short story collections, even though sometimes they are hit or miss, this one mostly missed. For one, just because it is short doesn't make it a short story. Most of these were story fragments, no start or no end or both. a short story should be more than just a chunk out of the middle of a story. Also, for stories that were supposed to be the same from two points of view, sometimes they didn't resemble each other at all.

All in all pretty much a miss, but there were a couple of decent ideas in them.



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Review: The Gold Crew

The Gold Crew by Thomas N. Scortia

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



This was a very scary book. The one set of nuclear weapons not directly under control is that set on submarines. What happens if due to some miscalculation an environmental toxin gets introduced to a closed system that results in mental instability of the entire crew of a nuclear missile submarine? Not much good likely. Scary, plausible, and gripping book.



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