Chanticleer Book Reviews

Category: Reviews

The GRAVITATIONAL LEAP by Darrell Lee – Post-Apocalyptic, Time-Travel, Action Adventure

In a grim, cold future world, a small elite group guards a treasure from another time in hopes they can somehow rewrite the past, even at the cost of their own lives.

Timo is a sharpshooter who, with his wife Alyd, guards the Tower, a bizarre ancient building in the center of their small realm where rulers live and ancient secrets are kept.

When Timo shoots down a nomadic intruder trying to penetrate the fortress, he finds an unusually beautiful knife among the dead man’s possessions and chooses to steal it for himself. When the knife’s true owner is revealed, Timo is not in danger as he and Alyd feared, but instead will be invited into the Tower’s elite circle.

Timo, Alyd and her mother Wen move into the Tower where he will work for the chief government official, Maldor. He is assigned to transcribe books from a time more than 500 years before, when their planet was not desolate and desperate—1963. This work, and what Maldor reveals to him privately, will shatter Timo and Alyd’s illusions; “the Great Plague” that they were taught about in school was something far more cataclysmic and sinister, bringing widespread death to a once-thriving planet.

Meanwhile, the nomadic tribes tired of being without electricity amass outside the Tower’s fortress, led by Maldor’s estranged son who rules by visions, signs and the immediacy of weather-related food shortages, to plan a surprise attack. They will storm and possibly destroy the Tower, little knowing its potential for the preservation of mankind. The masses blame Maldor’s crack-pot scientific theories for their plight and are insistent on battle. Only the sudden bursting of a distant star and the skills of Timo’s marksmanship can save the world…but to save it, everything Timo has ever known must disappear.

A debut novel by author Darrell Lee whose experience in the International Space Station informs the science behind this action-packed story, The Gravitational Leap is a bold but rational foray into the worlds of science and pseudoscience, a mix of nuclear weaponry, Einstein’s theories, and the always intriguing notion of time travel.

It is important to note that this is a post-apocalyptic story and not a dystopian. With believable characters and a mind-tickling premise: What if history could be reversed to avert a worldwide apocalypse?

Lee’s book also encompasses a touching romance, and the question of personal religious belief and its place in a society that longs for salvation. The characters recite Bible verses throughout the work. More could have been done to delineate presumed ethnic differences in the future world, quicken the pacing of the battle scenes, and there are long passages from a twentieth century submarine’s log that would have been better presented as dialog or broken up in another manner. There are instances where characters are introduced to further the plot, then disappear again. Yet, this is an intriguing work with logical concepts balanced by plenty of excitement and a surprise ending.

In a gripping tale that blends historical fact and scientific speculation, the hero of The Gravitational Leap must risk all to end the desperation of a failing civilization and spark the chance for a global reawakening.

April 19, 2017
AFTERMATH by Marilynn Larew – Mystery Suspense/Thriller/Female Sleuth

Mystery maven Marilynn Larew has devised a can’t-put-down thriller with a female lead who can handle everything from flying bullets, dead cats, and snakes in the jungle, with only the occasional meltdown in Aftermath.

It’s a normal day for private investigator Annie Carter when handsome, Irish, and possibly crazy “Don’t call me Charlie” Magee shows up at her townhouse/office/home claiming someone is trying to kill him. For one thing, a body fell out of a window and landed near him. But even more convincing, someone shoots a hole through Annie’s front window just as Magee arrives on her doorstep – and not long after that, they find a dead cat on the stoop.

But can Magee be for real? His stories are garbled, and sometimes he seems to be dodging the truth, but when she lets him move in (for his own protection) it turns out he’s a decent cook and, well, let’s say his interest in her is hard to resist.

Meanwhile, Annie’s lawyer daughter Elizabeth is bugging her because her boyfriend wants to get married, which is against Elizabeth’s feminist principles, and for some reason, it’s all Annie’s fault. Added to this chaotic, action-crammed and often witty mix is Annie’s newest client, Vivian Rowlandson, whose husband has disappeared without a trace. A complex inheritance means the client must find her spouse or lose all financial support for her over-sized mansion and ten horses. And just as all these mysteries build, Elizabeth is kidnapped.

Threading her way through other people’s bizarre problems is what Annie signed on for when she became a private investigator. It was the job best suited for a single parent. But now her mothering skills are questioned and her own life is in danger.

Eventually, the hunt for Vivian’s errant husband will take Annie to the shadowy, steaming jungles of Southeast Asia where human and reptile killers lurk around every tree—and where the charming Magee will prove a stalwart bodyguard—in more ways than one.

Practiced mystery novelist Larew (Dead in Dubai, The Spider Catchers) presents a plot that brings her expertise to the fore. With teaching and publishing credits in American and Vietnamese military history, she has also visited Hanoi and other far-flung places. Her Annie is a heroine for the mid-life generation: a gritty divorcee with a penchant for adventure and a secret passion for unruly older men. Larew sculpts Annie with just the right proportions of savoir-faire, guts, and a few moments of unabashed girly-ness.

Sure to please Larew’s fans and attract new ones, Aftermath is a welcome addition to the female detective mystery/thriller genre steeped in exotic locales, alluring hints of romance, bullets flying, people disappearing, and just enough humor to wrap it all together for the perfect read.

April 14, 2017
The ANGEL KILLER: Book Two of the Watcher Saga by Lisa Voisin – Young Adult/Urban Fantasy/Horror

High school is a little more complicated for Mia and her unusual boyfriend, Michael Fountaine. Miraculously recovered from a coma only a few months earlier, Michael has many secrets that only Mia truly understands. But love and understanding aren’t always enough to stay sane when the world outside is changing before their eyes.

These two never know when a day might include demons from the darkest pit, minions of despair, or hellhounds looking for a fresh kill. A battle of supernatural dimension is coming ever closer to the heart of their hometown of Seattle, and Mia will soon have her burgeoning power put to the ultimate test. If only she could believe in it more and trust in the strength of angels! Current and past struggles are interwoven for both of them when a powerful nemesis returns wielding a sword like no other. It’s unique, it has a name, and it’s lethal.

In book two of author Lisa Voisin’s The Watcher Saga, Mia and Michael reunite when Raguel returns with vengeance on his mind. With special abilities of her own, Mia is able to see Michael for what he really is and to aid in his battles while keeping his identity secret even from her best friends, and it isn’t easy! If only she could concentrate on more normal things, like Fiona and Dean, and enjoy the school’s wrestling matches. But her destiny is more complicated than that, and she knows it. She also knows that her love for Michael is worth anything to her, just as it has always been across the many lifetimes she is just now beginning to remember.

In The Angel Killer, certain details are prominent. Actual Seattle locations make strategic appearances, like the Smith Tower and the Underground, and the weather as described will be familiar to any Western Washingtonian. Voisin’s proper names, as well, are made to fit the character and mood. Each Angel, for example, has a name that ends with a similar sound, whether it’s Arielle, Turiel, Damiel, or Michael. These are beautiful beings with beautiful names.

Another character in Voisin’s book, Mia’s good friend Fatima, is described as a person with visions and her name is equally evocative, reminiscent of the little children of Fatima, a popular Catholic story. But it is with Fatima and her twin brother, Farouk, that Voisin veers from her narrative of Angels and Demons to one of more Middle Eastern content when Fatima is unwittingly possessed by a Djinn, and only the Angel Michael can help. The author’s attempt to meld these two very different descriptions of embodied evil may be unsuccessful for some readers expecting a more strictly Christian storyline, and yet, as early as page one it is Fatima’s gift of a Hamsa necklace that buzzes a warning for Mia when unseen Demons are near.

Overall, The Angel Killer: Book Two in the Watcher Saga is full of colorful Seattle locations and symbolic characters in this addition to Voisin’s continuing saga of Good vs. Evil. If you’ve already met Mia and Michael, or are just making their acquaintance for the first time, you’ll want to know how this battle ends.

April 14, 2017
PASSOVER by Aphrodite Anagnost and Robert P. Arthur – Horror/Psychological Thriller/Ghost Story

This novel is a multi-dimensional excursion into the paranormal. Its twists and turns take the reader on a circuitous route, where the impossible is ordinary, and there is no safe place.

Authors Aphrodite Anagnost and Robert P. Arthur have created a fast-paced, well-written read to challenge even the most hard-core fans of mystery and the supernatural. The writers use a mosaic of imaginative ideas, sensory detail, and historic events to move the reader through a morass of implausible events, to a chilling conclusion.

For the residents of Zebulon, a tiny, historic Virginia town on the Delmarva Peninsula, the world has become surreal. For the last three months, a serial murderer has been at work. On the night of the full moon, moving from house-to-house on Burnt Chestnut Road, this creature has committed atrocious acts.

Inexplicable smells, sights, and quirks of weather impinge upon the police investigation of these, driving most of Zebulon’s residents to flee in fear.

If the killer remains consistent, the next house in line is the home of Dr. Rachel Shelton and her family. One, or all of them, is destined to be the next victim, and tonight is the night. Rachel and her husband, Dave, try to prepare for the onslaught. Little do they know that sharp knives and loaded rifles cannot protect them.

Sheriff Phil Wise revisits the murder sites and struggles to make sense of the mayhem that occur at each, when “…all explanations seemed stranger than the crime scene itself…” Beatricia, Rachel’s mother, senses the truth, and her revelations help keep the reader engaged.

The frequency of multiple motifs, e.g., the unexplained smell of burnt wood, levitation of furniture, dis- and re-appearance of objects, random cold spots, and intermittent cessation of normal sound can work to distract the reader. Inconsistencies within the narrative, such as a kitchen floor that is described as linoleum, then tile, and then linoleum in the span of two pages, a discordant timeline of the murders, and a geographic site for one of the serial murders that contradicts the described pattern, detract from the storyline. However, Passover’s plot has “good bones,” and those who enjoy the genre will devour this work. The well-developed character of Beatricia, Rachel’s mother, goes a long way in helping maintain reader engagement.

Beatricia is not only a learned scholar but also a gifted medium, who views the horrendous events through the lens of spirituality. It is only after she enters the investigation with Lev, a Jewish apostate, that those old truths begin to reveal themselves, and the pieces begin to coalesce. Rachel must acknowledge and utilize her innate psychic abilities if they are to defeat the evil supernatural forces that surround and threaten them.

“Passover” by Aphrodite Anagnost and Robert P. Arthur takes the reader to a universe where the mundane meets the mystical. Here, the power of “animal magnetism” enables the dead to reanimate and materialize, and a charming teen-aged ghost attempts to seduce Rachel’s adolescent son.

In this altered reality, symbolism, echoes of ancient religions and myth, memories of age-old bondage, savage twentieth-century anti-Semitism, and ghosts and apparitions collide with everyday family conflict and strife. “Passover” is a paranormal mystery on steroids!

April 13, 2017
CURBCHEK RELOAD by Zach Fortier – True Crime/Police Memoir

Interspersed with surprising moments of dark humor, fervent police pranks, and told with unchecked language, CurbChek-Reload by Zach Fortier is an expose’ of the challenging and graphically violent situations that are reflections of his day-to-day experiences of his thirty-year career as a city police officer.

Fortier’s CurbChek-Reload is the third installment of his true-crime trilogy, The Curbchek Collection and takes readers on another ride through the arduous physical and emotional tribulations he experienced as a veteran police officer.

Fortier does not temper his prose when he describes the depth of indifference, cruelty, malice, and depravity people inflict upon themselves, their loved ones, or someone in the wrong place at the wrong time without regard to the consequences of all involved.

From the first sentence, the reader is positioned as a civilian who desires to witness the real underbelly of the mean streets and rides along in the patrol car. Fortier, who professes he hates ride along’s, recounts each story to you without emotion and in straightforward, curt exposition as if you’re watching over his shoulder. He articulates the benefits, downsides, and hazards of working the night shift, day shift, and with a four-legged partner armed with razor sharp teeth and a nasty independent streak.

The stories take place in an undefined location called Central City and do not have a time sequence. The book is somewhat of a hybrid as it does not follow the usual conventions of true crime or memoir and contains some minor craft issues. However, it shines in its representation of the hazardous and complex challenges faced by the police. Fortier admits that if the public actually knew how thinly spread the police department was at times (six officers for an entire city), there would have been absolute panic.

Fortier’s attitudes concerning some members of an apathetic society, duplicitous city leaders, inept police department management, and other officers are quite telling. He calls the people who drive into the city each morning to work Daywalkers.

Conversely, Fortier provides examples where he relied upon his ability to communicate to de-escalate dangerous situations such as domestic disturbances, suicidal gestures or attempts, a potential melee, insatiable drug abusers, and so on.

There is no overall plot or chronological framework to this story; rather, it’s a collection of episodic scenes without a story arc that occurred during the author’s law enforcement career. The writing style contains gives the impression this book is a transcription of the author’s recorded recollections of some of his intense situations that he experienced in his thirty-year career as a policeman.

Nevertheless, as written, this collection contains some indomitable, funny, freakish, sad, outlandish, and bizarre accounts that vividly reflects one police officer’s complex experiences that occur all in his line of duty to protect and to serve.

April 10, 2017
The Other La Bohème by Yorker Keith – Contemporary, Literary, Opera

Life is as complicated as an opera performance in Yorker Keith’s new literary work, The Other La Bohème. The setting is modern-day Manhattan, complete with a café that showcases singing wait staff and doubles as an art gallery, studio apartments full of painters and poets, and surprise performances are sung in Italian.

The Dolci Quattro, a group of four friends intent on making it in the challenging world of professional opera, is determined to stage a different version of this well-known work, doing everything they can to support each other when motivation is hardest to find. Luckily for them, wealthy patrons and loving family are always closer than they imagine.

Keith takes his novel into the realm of opera itself in many ways. The most obvious how the book is formatted – and the reader will notice this quickly, with each chapter heading listed as a “scene” and the book itself divided into “Acts.” And like any good opening scene, we meet the major characters immediately.

Four singers have been friends since college days and have dubbed themselves The Dolci Quattro, the sweet four. It’s through their singing, often in Italian and always translated, that readers who have no familiarity with this art form will be able to see its enduring legacy and relevance to modern life. Whatever personal situation arises, at least one of the four has an aria to help express the emotion.

By Keith using this technique opera, itself, takes center stage. Dialogue often swirls around what it means to sing or be a singer, becoming technical at times, yet exploring the emotional and physical demands of the profession, while descriptive passages can encompass many of the main characters at once, mimicking the most enlightening program notes.

Similarly, the main story line of The Dolci Quattro’s attempt to successfully stage a lesser version of the most famous opera performed in America, Puccini’s La Bohème, by performing the work of the same name composed by the lesser known Leoncavallo, echoes their frustrations as individual vocal artists. They are starting from near obscurity, each working in poverty–what was once referred to as Bohemia– but with passionate and undeniable talent.

Their gamble of performing a nearly unknown variation of the opera mirrors the often-difficult choices and explanations each character faces about their futures and their professional careers. Like many an opera production as well, the reader is asked to accept life for the Dolci Quattro in all of its most broad and painted strokes.

Tragedies are short-lived, triumphs universal, offering us all a glimpse into the unique world of lead singers and understudies and what it takes to make it to the top in a competitive field. In the repeated refrain of The Dolci Quattro, Keith’s work urges all of us to “Sing On!”

March 24, 2017
The Thinara King by Rebecca Lochlann – Historical Fiction/Fantasy/Mythology

There’s only sorrow for Aridela, the heiress to the throne of Kapthor when she learns her heart is not hers to give freely and every decision she makes concerning her love life brings about dire consequences for her people in Rebecca Lochlann’s The Thinara King, Book 2 of The Child of the Erinyes series.

When Aridela meets Chrysaleon, a Greek “barbarian” by the standards of her people, she falls in love. Chrysaleon, young, bold and brash, is as smitten with Aridela as she is with him, but he has been promised in marriage to her sister Iphiboë, who is bland and boring by comparison.

The marriage is all important, though, as it will consolidate his father’s power, linking his lineage with that of the Aridela’s culture, a culture that reveres the power and station of women. Kapthor is ruled by Aridela’s mother Queen Helice and guided by the powerful female oracle Themiste.

Aridela and Chrysaleon cannot help but consummate their forbidden love, yet as they do, a volcano erupts, devastating the island and killing many of Aridela’s relatives and friends. The volcano, seen as goddess Athene’s handiwork, is blamed on Chrysaleon, who has been identified by Themiste as the “lion” or the Thinara King, foretold in an ancient prophecy linking him to Aridela and a mysterious, unidentified bull figure. The prophecy states that this triad has the power to restore or destroy the world.

Rebecca Lochlann skillfully immerses the reader in a semi-fictional world of ancient rites and conflicts where characters live, die, and are reborn throughout her series The Child of the Erinyes.

The product of many years of study and fascination with the era and the mythology, The Thinara King establishes Lochlann’s connection with the novel’s setting and genre by smoothly combining many convincing elements: the handsome hero determined to win the strong-minded fair lady, the dark anti-hero plotting on the sidelines, the wise demi-goddess who keeps her own counsel and manipulates outcomes behind the scenes, the grisly battles fought at close range, and the spectacular festivals marking the passing of the years.

Lochlann’s over-arching narrative, switching from character to character, is deftly composed, making for many surprises without deviating from the backdrop with its elaborate history-rich trappings.

A tale of ancient kingdoms, of love promised and lost, heralded victory and hopeless defeat is the second novel in her much-acclaimed series, The Child of the Erinyes – another masterfully written historical fiction novel of Ancient Greece from Rebecca Lochlann.

March 24, 2017
NIXON and DOVEY: The Legend Returns by Jay Curry – Antebellum South, Gun Slinging, Historical Fiction

Launch into a gun-slinging, horse racing, antebellum southern historical biographically-based novel in this larger than life surprise, Nixon and Dovey: The Legend Returns.

Imagine searching through the local archives in hopes of discovering a long-lost ancestor only to stumble upon a memoir written about the early days of the area in which this ancestor lived. And another find – an article about the ancestor that has alluded you for so long surfaces. As you read it, however, your stomach turns. The ancestor you have sought for so long turns out to be the most notorious murderer and villain of the day. In this page-turner, Jay Curry tells the story of his ancestor, Nixon Curry, and his sad end.

Curry opens his tale at the very beginning: Nixon learns to shoot and ride as a youngster and finds he’s quite good at it. In fact, he loves riding so much his one desire is to open a stable and breed thoroughbreds – just like the rich people in his town. Unfortunately, Nixon is not rich, nearly unforgivable in the antebellum south. And Nixon, much to the dismay of his father, has a temper.

He may have been able to climb his way out of the first tragic situation, by, perhaps winning the Governor’s Cup, the big horse race of the day. But the second, his volcanic disposition, he will never be able to escape. Now Jay Curry’s ancestor must come to grips with the fact that dreams don’t always come true and life doesn’t always go according to plan.

At its heart, though, this book is a love story. Nixon falls in love with a senator’s daughter, Dovey Caldwell. Unfortunately for the ill-fated lovers, her daddy has already set her up with Nixon’s arch rival and wealthy Southern son. Much like the sorry tales of love-struck couples of yore, the youngsters run off together and cause all sorts of consternation.

Nixon and Dovey: The Legend Returns is a heart-pounding, page-turning read straight from the pages of an 1800’s diary and family lore of author, Jay Curry.

March 23, 2017
ONCE UPON A SCANDAL by Julie LeMense – Regency Romance/Historical Romance

Since there’s no such thing as a perfect person, we can’t say that Julie LeMense has written a perfect Regency romance.

Darn close, though.

Once Upon a Scandal nails it on so many levels: plot and characters driven by the era they live in; smooth, clean writing; a fully realized heroine who’s smart, vulnerable, resourceful, flawed, compassionate, and funny; an aristocrat hero who’s believable as a man; and a fresh, twisty plot that demands pages be turned to find out what happens next.

Because the story is a romance, we can expect a happy ending. How Jane and Benjamin are ever going to find it, however, remains a mystery until the end. Both are trapped in their roles in society and hide dangerous secrets behind their identities. Jane actually has to give up her identity and become a false person in order to escape poverty and shame. Her sacrifice, it turns out, helps save her country from a traitor—who just might be her own father.

Operating in disguise creates a satisfying turnabout, wherein the honest woman rejected by society allures the snobs, doyennes, and chauvinists into eating out of her dishonest hand. Jane observes: “Their strict rules and codes of conduct had been instituted for one reason and one alone: to prove themselves superior. They didn’t judge a person’s suitability by intellect, achievement, or even kindness.”

That thought forms the theme of the novel and the deceptions practiced throughout it.

Jane’s identity switcheroo is engineered by Benjamin for his own noble yet selfish purposes, though he soon realizes he’s bitten off more than he can chew and falls crazy in love with the real Jane—jeopardizing both of their masquerades.

The moral and behavioral strictures of society during England’s Regency period seem unbelievable to those of us reading about it generations later. But they were painfully real at the time and forced many a clandestine affair. This suppression gives plausibility to the characters’ secrets and skulduggery; and the era’s lack of technology as we know it allows them to get away with stunts that would be immediately caught, and widely broadcast, today. Thus, when modern anachronisms appear in the narrative, they draw attention to themselves. The word “feminist,” for example, used in conversation by Jane in 1813, was not actually coined until decades later. Bloopers like this in such a period-sensitive novel raise doubts about the rest in the reader’s mind.

Fortunately, the story holds its own with romantic intrigue and close brushes with disaster. The result is a conflict parfait, with Jane and Benjamin’s impossible love at the top, overlying the contradictions and inequities of their society, which forms a harsh class division between the haves and have-nots, in a country deep at war. In this multi-layer mess, how can anyone dream that true love will conquer all?

Jane and Benjamin give it their best shot in this classy, cork-screwy romance that turns scandal on its head.

March 21, 2017
Greylock by Paula Cappa – Mystery/Thriller/Paranormal

What’s in the music we create? When we say it lives – when we say it breathes – when, for one fleeting moment it seems to bridge the gap between one soul and another – what kind of existence does it assume? What does it feel? What does it think? What does it want? Such questions may reside in theory for most, but not for piano virtuoso Alexei Georg in Paula Cappa’s Greylock.

Hot off the release of what will surely be his magnum opus, October, Alexei has achieved the level of success found only in his wildest dreams. Hailing from a Russian family steeped in musical artistry, he has transcended all those before him and become something they never could: a legend. And that’s all thanks to October.

There’s only one problem: he didn’t compose it.

And that would have been fine for him, taking credit for pages found in an antique chest belonging to one of his ancestors, if it weren’t for the demons it conjured every time he plays those chords. If it weren’t for the shadowy figure haunting him, punishing him, coming for him. October may have surfaced through the Georg bloodline, but there is something far more sinister and mysterious hidden in each note that is threatening to break free from Alexei’s control.

Alexei wants nothing more than to move on, but the past will not let him. Add to his troubles the threat of fraud exposure from those he’s closest to and a string of grisly murders within the Boston music community that brings the police knocking on his door, he can only come to realize just how much October is at the center of it all. He’ll have to confront three generations worth of Georg family demons to overcome this evil before it claims everything he has and hopes to achieve.

Using music as a central motif and life force to drive the narrative, Paula Cappa defies the limitations of the written word and adds a new dimension in storytelling through the personification of music. The descriptions being so richly layered and animated, one might just imagine these nightmares dwelling in the punctuation, awaiting their chance to come alive themselves.

With just enough integral characters in place to create conflict, Cappa creates a compelling mystery that allows the reader to virtually hear the machinations of the plot grind away before they inevitably crank up to a satisfying crescendo.

March 18, 2017