Review: Ring of Fire

Humans and Mystics have been at war for as long as Kala can remember. For this reason, contact with any of the magical creatures that inhabit the forest near her home is punishable by death.

So when an elf rescues her from being kidnapped by his brother, she has good reason to question his motives. That is, until she learns the truth: that it was a human who killed her mother, not a Mystic, and that she and the whole kingdom are being lied to.

But confiding in the wrong person opens old wounds, and Kala must choose between her family and a blossoming romance. Can her love unite their people? Or has she doomed everyone she cares about?

Review: The Weave of Fate

The city of Wyvern’s Rest has fallen…

The feud between the capital cities of Cambridge and Sephyra has reached a boiling point, leaving the former “Jewel of the Highlands” a ghost of its former glory. Those with the means to live and the will to dream have already fled the city. Those lacking remain, condemned to bury their sorrow while the walls crumble around them. Lawlessness and poverty have overtaken the streets, and as the days grow longer, the shadows of the abandoned Outer Quarter loom ever darker.

Ava spends her days tethered to her prison, the belly of an old, stone inn, overlooking the docks and the familiar, sea-side market. She leans on her friends for innocent laughter and talk of unimportant things. Every day, the tavern fills with the hopes and dreams of those fleeing for brighter horizons; and every day, Ava watches them leave with the simplest wish…to join them.

Little does she know, her fate is woven to the enormous, crimson carriage that creaks through the shadows of another forgotten morning. The odd-shaped man who emerges from the carriage carries two simple things: an old, leather satchel and a sinister secret. One will free Ava from her prison. One will forever seal her tomb.

Both will alter the course of Wyvern’s Rest forever.

Review: One Hundred Bullets

Captain Lou Rush of the New Orleans police department is the leader of the Tribunal, a band of 10 cops dedicated to eliminating the criminals that fall through the cracks of the justice system. Their success has made them powerful and untouchable in the Crescent City, but that is about to change.

After two decades, the time has come for Lou Rush’s son Nick to join the Tribunal, as aging members are due to retire. However, a fellow officer is killed by the Tribunal, and Nick discovers that his father may have also murdered an innocent man.

For years, Nick’s fiancé Cali Maddox quietly blends into the background. With an agenda of her own, her secrets will force father and son to decide where their true loyalties lie – with the Tribunal or with the love of Nick’s life, because one of them will not survive the aftermath.

Review: Amasai Rising

Finding out you’re a princess destined to stop a war sounds great, until it actually happens.

Amasai Rising is an enchanting young-adult coming-of-age fantasy novel set in the Kingdom of Aythia. Azlana is a half-human, half-elf princess on the run, forced from the only home she has ever known and shouldered with the responsibility of uniting men and mystics. But an ancient darkness has taken hold of Azlana’s mind, flooding her thoughts that horrify her.

Can Azlana defeat the darkness? Or will its hold on her prove fatal for magic and mankind alike?

Previously published as Anhedonia.

Review: What Ianthe Knew

Five years ago, Arielle’s dream life with Caleb was derailed when he left for Boston in search of work. Only, he never made it and turned up dead. Now, Arielle struggles to piece together what happened, while raising their daughter Ianthe alone.

A mysterious stranger shows up and suggests that Ianthe might know what happened to Caleb. Only, Ianthe has never met her father. Caleb’s secrets begin to come to light, and it’s all Arielle can do to keep her and her daughter safe.

But how can she, when Ianthe holds the key to the truth but is too frightened to talk about what she knows? What really happened to Caleb? All Arielle knows is that she’d better figure it out – and fast.

Review: The Ursulina

I know you’ll never forgive me for what I did. I’m sure you’ve asked yourself that question many times over the years.

Why? Why did I do it?

Well, sweetheart, this is the answer.

I was only twenty-six years old when the monster came back to Black Wolf County. The answers you want begin at Christmas time that year. However, if you really want to understand everything that happened to me—to us—you have to go even further back in my life.

Years back, to the night I met the Ursulina face to face.

So let’s start there.

Review: Who Did You Tell?

Astrid is newly sober and trying to turn her life around. Having reluctantly moved back in with her mother, in a quiet seaside town away from the temptations and darkness of her previous life , she is focusing on her recovery. She’s going to meetings. Confessing her misdeeds. Making amends to those she’s wronged. If she fills her days, maybe she can outrun the ghosts that haunt her. Maybe she can start anew.

But someone is tormenting me now. Someone knows where I am and what I’ve done.

Someone knows exactly what Astrid is running from. And they won’t stop until she learns that some mistakes can’t be corrected. Some mistakes, you have to pay for . . .

Review: The Sweetest Revenge

Abigail’s had a crush on Mackenzie, the motorcycle courier, for months, but Mackenzie doesn’t even know she exists. Nothing exists for Mackenzie, though, except for her pride and joy – her Ducati Monster.

After an unpleasant encounter, Abigail decides to get her own back on Mackenzie – in the worst possible way. Despite the pleas of her colleagues, Abigail plans to hide Mackenzie’s precious motorbike and take the haughty so-and-so down a peg or two.

Naturally, when Mackenzie discovers her bike is gone, there are fireworks. It’s April 1, so she suspects trickery rather than criminal activity, but that doesn’t mean the person responsible will be getting off lightly….

Review: Weekend at Wilderhope Manor

When Stephanie and Jenny go to a murder mystery Halloween weekend at Wilderhope Manor, they’re expecting fun and games. But following creaky floorboards, spooky noises and an alarming encounter in the manor’s grounds, the girls begin to wonder if there’s more to Wilderhope Manor than meets the eye. As they find frequent comfort in one another’s arms – and their bed – will the girls discover what’s causing the bumps in the night, or will they run scared?

Review: A True History of the United States

Written by a combat veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, A True History of the United States grew out of a course that Daniel A. Sjursen taught to cadets at West Point, his alma mater. With chapter titles such as “Patriots or Insurgents?” and “The Decade That Roared and Wept”, A True History is accurate with respect to the facts and intellectually honest in its presentation and analysis.