Book Reviews | Self-Publishing Review

Review: Through a Forest of Stars by David C. Jeffrey

Author David C. Jeffrey plunges readers into a grim and gorgeous future for humanity in Through a Forest of Stars. Following in the astral footsteps of legendary sci-fi world-builders, this first installment of the Space Unbound series is an original and thrilling space drama.

Since humanity’s epic discovery of voidoids – portals to other solar systems – the species’ fingers have spread through the stars, though there is a mysterious limit to this new era of exploration. Despite this revelatory shift in the 22nd century, “bound space” seems to be an endless sea of dead moons and planets, but […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2021-06-21T03:27:49+02:00April 8th, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: David C. Jeffrey, Science Fiction|

Review: Pike’s Potential by John J Spearman

Three multi-system empires collide in Pike’s Potential, an immersive military space thriller by veteran author John J Spearman.

Commander Pike of the Planetary Alliance, a leader with a star on the rise, must navigate the opening moves of a complex cosmic battlefield as the different factions of the human diaspora once again clash in an epic war. Balancing classic political machinations with naval maneuvering and battles edging towards the speed of light, this novel may be science fiction, but it has a firm base in a reality that military fiction readers will enjoy.

Though the swashbuckling in this novel […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2022-04-11T09:33:44+02:00April 5th, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: John J Spearman, Science Fiction|

Review: Looking for Tennessee Williams by George Sanchez

Author George Sanchez crafts an epic tale of romance, history, and New Orleans in Looking for Tennessee Williams. In this richly envisioned and expansive novel, a cast of collegiate actors make their way to the Big Easy for a theatre festival in the early 1960s, navigating the politically charged landscape of the South, as well as their own internal dramas, betrayals, and desires.

Told in exceptional detail, this novel roughly spans a month in the autumn of 1963, though the majority takes place over only a week – the same infamous week when an assassin in Dallas changed the […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2021-06-07T02:45:40+02:00April 5th, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Historical Fiction|

Review: Once A Man Indulges by Tony Kelsey

Wartime loyalty, dangerous dames, and mountain mobsters collide in Once a Man Indulges, a PI thriller from the meticulous pen of author Tony Kelsey.

This neo-noir tale is set in post-war 1949, when ongoing survival was far from promised, and the soldiers who had come back were often scarred in ways too complex to explain. An unexpected reunion with a past military mentor sends Harry Thorpe, rough-around-the-edges private detective, spiraling into the dark depths of Denver’s seediest realms, in this gritty blend of mystery and history.

Harry Thorpe is both original and familiar – a scarred protagonist with a […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2021-06-02T08:54:36+02:00April 1st, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Detective Fiction, Noir|

Review: Braving the World by Pam Saylor

A dynamic couple decide to make retirement a gateway to shared overseas adventures in Braving the World: Adventures in Travel and Retirement by Pam Saylor.

This engaging memoir covers all the highs and lows of an ambitious stay abroad. Pam and her husband Dave each had areas of expertise and both were highly detail-oriented, which would be crucial to the year-long escape they envisioned, the “bel sogno,” the beautiful dream: a year in Italy, half in Rome, half in Venice. Before they could leave they had to rent out their home, find a year-long dog sitter, sell their cars, store […]

SPR2021-05-25T04:14:55+02:00March 31st, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Travel|

Review: The Dragon’s Zenith by Jason F. Boggs

Strap in for a nonstop cosmic ride in The Dragon’s Zenith, the final book in the Dragon Trilogy by author Jason F. Boggs. Wrapping up a galaxy’s worth of loose ends in style, this novel delivers an ultimate showdown loyal readers may not be expecting, as well as unexpected new allies, strange alien worlds, and that engaging blend of fantasy and sci-fi that this series has done so well from the start.

With the world-building basics and character exposition out of the way, this third and final novel dives right into the action, as well as the personal entanglements. Alene […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2021-05-04T03:37:42+02:00March 30th, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Fantasy, Jason F. Boggs|

Review: Reality by DC Wince

Near-future fiction at its finest, Reality by DC Wince is a thrilling and unpredictable leap into fight or flight mode. In bits and pieces, readers are submerged in a strange carnival of limitless power, the desperate search for truth, and the raw potential of humanity’s survival instinct.

Charlie, Dale, Blaze, and Ernst make for an odd quartet of protagonists, particularly because they spend a decent amount of this novel hunting one another in a winner-take-all death race in the desert. However, the backstory passages of their lives, and the strange events leading up to their Lord of the Flies face-off […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2021-03-30T07:03:42+02:00March 30th, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews, Lead Story|Tags: DC Wince, Science Fiction, Thriller|

Review: Pushing Bobby’s Cadillac by Allan Dare Pearce

Rich in historical detail and thick with visceral emotion, Pushing Bobby’s Cadillac by Allan Dare Pearce is a bold and tangled novel about racial injustice, finding one’s purpose, and the lengths that power will go to remain unchallenged.

Aiken Day is far from perfect, haunted by his own violent past, but the death of Paris, his civil rights activist wife, sends him careening into the dangerous world of political subterfuge, racial violence, and country-spanning conspiracy. Bouncing smoothly between Detroit, Florida, New Hampshire, Ontario, and other oft-overlooked pockets of the continent, this one-day-per-chapter novel sets itself a tall task with a […]

John Staughton, Senior Reviewer2021-05-03T04:58:38+02:00March 22nd, 2021|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: Historical Fiction|