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Julia Stone’s locked door is unlocked. Wood blocks spelling out her nickname are on her coffee table. Her digital clock is stuck on the same time; 4:06. Her shut window is wide open. Eyes stare at her from the darkness outside. Someone is obviously trying to gaslight her. Or maybe she’s just crazy. After years of therapy, Julia is having trouble distinguishing between what’s real and what isn’t. And she doesn’t know whom to trust. Her therapist who’s trying to help rid her of panic attacks? The local handyman who keeps showing up at her door? Her long-time boyfriend who is anxious to get married? Her nosy old neighbor? Or are they all just creeps like the nameless, faceless entities she conjures in her mind?

The Skull Ring is a psychological thriller, one that had me hooked from beginning to end. In fact, I stayed up till 2:00 a.m. reading the last six chapters because I just couldn’t put it down! I particularly liked Julia Stone; she keeps fighting to maintain her sanity, and rather than act like a helpless victim, she uses her background as a reporter to investigate her own past. She’s determined to overcome her panic attacks through therapy rather than drugs, and once she realizes the true character of someone she trusted, she doesn’t hesitate in rejecting him. She has moments of wanting to give in and give up, but she doesn’t. She keeps trying to overcome whatever obstacles are holding her back, whether they be real or imagined.

The Skull Ringis well written, highly suspenseful, and avoids being preachy despite its religious undertones. The ending was fairly satisfying, because I totally believed the methods and motives of some characters; for instance, the sheriff and the therapist. They had vastly different outlooks on how they wanted this story to end, but I believed them both. I liked the idea of a “long con” being played, and I like the idea of one (or more) fanatical true believers in a cult. But I don’t buy big decades-long conspiracies, especially one that leaves mutilated bodies in its wake. No one notices a pattern? Really? I won’t go into any more detail because I want to avoid spoilers. But I was a bit disappointed in some of the concluding reveals.

I also felt a few loose ends were left hanging, such as Julia’s aversion to a barn near her childhood home. She has a horryfiing memory while in the barn, but it’s never clearly explained how she came to have that particular memory. We’re left to our own conclusions about it, but I prefer things more clearly spelled out at the end, especially when the story has us constantly guessing between the reality and fantasy of the main character’s experiences. We also never find out specifically what happened to Julia’s father–we pretty much know what, just not the how and where. I would like to have known. Morbid curiosity, I suppose. And how the heck do you get a digital clock to stay stuck on the same numbers?

But despite my complaints here, I did enjoy the story overall and look forward to reading more from Scott Nicholson. Be sure to read my interview with him.

Click here to buy the paperback or Kindle version.from Amazon
Click here to buy the PDF version from DriveThruHorror.com (Read part of the 1st chapter for free)
Click here to buy all other versions from Smashwords.com (Read Chapters 1 – 3 for free)
Click here to visit the Author’s website
Click here to buy a signed trade paperback

No Date for Gomez! is a prequel novella to the No Hope for Gomez! series. It is a complete and stand-alone story. No Hope for Gomez! is now available from Amazon.
Price: Free
Author Bio: Graham Parke is responsible for a number of technical publications and has recently patented a self-folding map. He has been described as both a humanitarian and a pathological liar. Convincing evidence to support either allegation has yet to be produced.

No Hope for Gomez! is Graham’s fiction debut. You can visit his website at www.grahamparke.com.

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When Graham Parke sent me an email requesting a review of No Date for Gomez!, my initial inclination was to turn him down. The description of his novella didn’t quite appeal to me, and neither did the cover. (I know, I know, don’t judge a digital book by its cover*.) But since I like to give authors a chance to win me over, I looked to see if by chance there was a preview of the first chapter to read. (I like to read a snippet of any book before I pass final judgment.) To my surprise, the entire ebook was a freebie! I downloaded the PDF version, figuring I’d read the first few paragraphs, hate them, and thus feel no guilt in sending a kindly rejection email.

But the first sentence got me interested, so I read more, then a little more, and by the time I finished the first chapter–a mere 2½ pages later–I was hopelessly hooked. I had planned to do some productive work on the computer (paying bills, working on taxes, etc.), but instead I spent the next hour or so reading the entire story, smiling and laughing practically the entire time. No Date for Gomez!is absolutely hilarious.

Gomez is a nerdy, nice guy (sort of like Peter Parker at the beginning of Spider-Man, before he gets his spidey superpowers) who is completely clueless when it comes to people of the female persuasion. He falls for the beautiful new girl in his building, Gretchen, and immediately tries to come up with schemes to get her to go out with him. His priority is to show her how cool he is, so that when he gets around to asking her out, she’ll say yes. Unfortunately, he becomes tongue-tied whenever he runs into her, so their conversations typically go something like this:

I could remember talking to people. Knowing the kinds of things one said in polite conversation. I could remember making people think and laugh. But, at that very moment, I couldn’t put my finger on any of the words one might use when running into a fellow human being in a hallway.

Gretchen smiled and said, “Hi!”

Which was one of the words one might use.

“How are you doing today?”

Which, I now recalled, was a bunch of others.

Gomez soon becomes convinced Gretchen is annoyed with him, which turns out to be true, but not for the reasons he imagines. My only confusion after finishing the novella was that the dark secret Gretchen is hiding isn’t revealed or even hinted at. When I asked Parke about that, he said that there is more to come. I can’t wait!

No Date for Gomez! is the most fun read I’ve had in a long time. Do yourself a favor; turn off the depressing news, skip the latest episode of Lost, and read this instead. It’ll put you in a better mood.

Click here to download No Date for Gomez!
Click here to visit Graham Parke’s website
Click here for a chance to receive a free signed, printed copy of No Date for Gomez!

*Update: Parke provided a new cover that I like better; that’s the one posted here. 

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I totally related to Suze Hall. She’s a forty something, graying, slightly overweight, associate editor who has the boss from hell. I fit that physical description, and though I had a different job title, I’ve had a female boss almost as nasty as Wanda Walsh. I empathized with Suze as she dealt with the kind of office politics I left behind four years ago. Her family struggles were also totally believable–how to become a career woman while still staying connected to her children’s lives, and how to understand her husband’s desire to temporarily leave her just when her old boyfriend shows up after twenty years. Her reactions are at once contradictory and authentic. When she tells a big lie at work that only her old boyfriend can rectify, we feel her dread as everything spirals out of control.

I loved the humor Bell brought to her writing–and her character’s personality. In the beginning of the book, Suze muses,

I have come to understand that the big questions such as, What is my purpose in life? and Why am I here? converge with the little questions like, Where is my other shoe? and When will pot roast go on sale? Big questions, little questions, big thoughts, little thoughts, even famous people have them. So we’re not so different.

Except for the limos.

Bell writes well, capturing the clever, mundane, and sometimes random thoughts running through Suze’s mind perfectly. During a romantic escapade, the writing suddenly turns more and more florid, which at first confused me, until I realized the reason for the purple prose, and loved the jest. The ending is satisfying, though I would have liked an epilogue to let us know if everything turns out where it seems it’s headed. The ending is also preceded with an essay written by the character which seems too much like a “moral to the story.” Although I liked the essay itself, it seemed too long and I soon wanted to get back to the real story.

But overall, Walking With Elephants was a fun read, and I recommend it.

Buy Walking With Elephants (pdf)
Buy Walking With Elephants (lit)
Read the first chapter
Karen S. Bell’s website

A Worthy Legacy has won the following awards: Silver Award in the Inspirational/Spiritual Category of The Young Voices Foundation’s 2009 Young Voices Award, Second position in the Inspirational/Spiritual Category of the 2008 Reader Views Literary Award, Second position in the Young Adult Non-fiction category of the 2008 Reader Views Literary Award, and Top Book Awards by Black Pearls Magazine sponsored by EDC Creations.

Price: $13.95 (paperback)
Author Bio: Tomi (aka Ibitomilade) Akinyanmi discovered her enthusiasm for writing at an early age, and has been writing for over twenty years. Though poetry is her first love, Tomi was inspired by personal experiences to create A Worthy Legacy as her first book.

Her works include Voices in the Wind winner of the inaugural Voices Anthology Contest sponsored by The Voices Anthology Network. Some of her poems have also appeared in Free Focus, Northern Stars and Soul Fountain as well as online on poetry websites.

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In the eloquently written A Worthy Legacy, a granddaughter hurries home to her Nigerian village to gather with family as her grandfather lays dying. Although technically a work of fiction, the words of wisdom conveyed by the grandfather in the story are based on years of conversations the author had with her own father before his sudden death due to a car accident. She wrote A Worthy Legacy as a loving tribute to him, preserving his memory and the impact his teachings had on her life.

Akinyanmi sketches out the story’s setting, letting us feel the scorching sun and hot winds of the Nigerian village, but doesn’t dwell on the scenery. Characters are named but not fleshed out; their backgrounds and personalities remain untold. Instead, the focus is on the parting words and writings of the grandfather. At barely 101 pages, A Worthy Legacy promises to be a quick read, but the truths presented by the grandfather necessitate a slower pace to truly appreciate the insights imparted.

A Worthy Legacy should be viewed not so much as a novel, but as a book of poetry, quotations, and age-old wisdom. Much of the book reminded me of the Biblical Proverbs; filled with advice and admonitions from someone who’s lived and learned it the hard way–and who hopes subsequent generations heed the guidance.

Read Akinyanmi’s comments about getting A Worthy Legacy published.

Learn more about A Worthy Legacy and Tomi Akinyanmi.
Buy A Worthy Legacy here.
Check out the book trailer on Youtube

eBook Reviews Online is just one stop on Tomi Akinyanmi’s blog tour!
Visit the other sites of the tour here:

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Bumps in the Night hits a few bumps in the road in its endeavor to terrify the reader,
but for the most the part the anthology contains well-written and entertaining tales. William Todd has a great knack for capturing the narrative style of nineteenth-century characters, which enhances the gothic feel of two of my favorites: The Whitaker House Curse and Jack. And either Todd has a vast vocabulary–or made ample use of a good thesaurus–because several words sprinkled throughout the stories sent me searching
for definitions at Dictionary.com. It isn’t often a fiction writer stumps me with a word, much less several, so I’m impressed with that alone.

The Whitaker House Curse is a first-person account in which the protagonist hurriedly relates his fateful tale under threat of an imminent deadline. It has such great voice I almost felt I was reading something from Edgar Allen Poe. However, the epilogue seemed a bit tacked on and unnecessary, and it almost ruined the ending for me. I think the story would be better without it. On the other hand, Jack, a chilling first-person take on the infamous serial killer, probably has the most surprising–and ultimately,
pleasing–endings in this collection.

Rounding out my favorites of the bunch are The Night Stalker and Bumps in the Night. In The Night Stalker, a prostitute suspects her latest john may just be a killer when he drives her down a dark, isolated road. The second half of the story is terrifying, and I loved the ending. Bumps in the Night is told from the viewpoint of a Down Syndrome girl–a delightful young protagonist with a fresh, new voice–who once a month listens to the horrifying sounds of her father’s transformations. My only quibble with this story is that because it’s written with Todd’s wonderful slightly turn-of-the-century tone, the mention of computers by the protagonist jarred me; until then my mind’s eye had placed the setting in the distant past, not modern times.

Similarly, the characters in The People Under The River speak like 1930’s gangsters, so their references to 1970’s pop culture (and use of a weapon created in the 80’s) made me reorient my initial impression of the time period. This story, in which two killers’ dumping ground is at risk of discovery by an innocent young couple, is the least frightening, since it doesn’t deal with anything supernatural, though it has a satisfying ending. The malevolent entity encountered in Ghost Hunters had the potential to be the most terrifying for me, but the ending fizzled instead of sizzled. The same was true for The Delivery, in which a scientifically-minded courier has his beliefs turned inside out, though the narrative benefits from Todd’s period tone of voice.

In Eyes, an arrogant businessman disses the wrong old woman and finds himself fighting for his life. The storyline was predictable, but I found the consequences of his actions chilling nonetheless. An FBI agent investigates the disappearance of several people in the creepy and macabre Flesh and Blood, and though I thought the ending was darkly humorous, I couldn’t tell whether it was intentionally so.

I generally don’t read (or watch) horror, because though I enjoy being scared in the moment, I typically regret it by nightfall when I urgently feel the need to go to bed with an ornately bejeweled cross and a spray bottle filled with holy water. So Bumps in the Night elicited just about the right amount of spook for me–I was entertained but slept just fine after reading it. While not all the stories are perfect, Todd has great writing style, likable characters, and knows how to keep the reader in suspense. I look forward to reading more from him.

Click here to read an excerpt
Click here to order Bumps in the Night

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