Tag: Blackstone Publishing

ARC Review | The Enigma Affair – by Charlie Lovett

Ex-military Patton Harcourt lives a quiet life as a librarian in small town North Carolina. When a sniper upsets her morning pastry making, she’s forced to team up with professional assassin Nemo to foil an elaborate neo-Nazi plot to discover Heinrich Himmler’s lost recipe for Alchemy. If Patton and Nemo do not get to it first, the Third Reich have all it needs to return to power and perpetuate their horror on the world once again.

I’m a bit of WWII History nerd, so this one piqued my interest immediately, especially when the title says Enigma and Bletchley Park was mentioned on the back cover. I went on the 75th Anniversary of D-Day tour with EF Tours in 2019 and visited many of the places these characters go in Enigma Affair. Bletchley Park was one of them and was absolutely incredible.

While on that tour, we also visited several Holocaust memorials and learned in depth history and details about some of atrocities that took place, which are also deeply threaded into this book. I was engrossed in Lovett’s characters and in tune to their purpose throughout the book.

Lovett did a phenomenal job with his research in regard to Bletchley Park and its contribution to the Allied victory, WWII artifacts and timelines, Nazis, the Holocaust, and neo-Nazis too. His blend of factual Nazi propaganda strategies and modern-day outreach methods enhanced by technological advances was brilliant and thorough. I can totally see people (literally and figuratively) with sinister motives preying on the good graces of everyday people to further their evil intentions without a second thought.

Charlie Lovett’s character voices were distinct, and their personalities intriguingly flawed, which I enjoyed. Each main character had something from their past that haunted them and directly influenced their interactions and beliefs about the world and wove nicely into the plot of the story. Even the villain was well developed, and her plans to return Nazism to global prominence were closer to possible than I was comfortable with, so the stakes were extremely high for me.

That said, I felt the beginning was a bit slow. When Patton and Nemo teamed up, I didn’t get a good sense of the anxiety of the situation that I feel two strangers being shot at would have, but after a few chapters this smoothed out really nicely.

There were also a couple things that I felt were edging on Deus ex Machina. It seemed like the one person in the world with the expertise they needed to solve a clue either showed up at the right time or they knew them personally. Despite feeling a bit convenient at times, I still enjoyed the story immensely.

The Enigma Affair is filled with suspense, betrayal, intrigue, and haunting facts from humanity’s darkest years that, if forgotten, have the potential to be repeated again. The Enigma Affair is not only a thrilling work of fiction, but it’s a reminder that the evils of yesteryear could easily creep into our future if we are not vigilant.

The Enigma Affair is being published by Blackstone Publishing on 6 September and is currently available for pre-order.

Happy Writing!
~MJ

ARC Review | Edgewater Road – By Shelley Shepard Gray

Edgewater Road by Shelley Shepard Gray

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


When Jennifer Smiley, a work-from-home introvert, moves into her late grandmother’s home, she’s unsure what to expect. Going through all the boxes, she discovers there’s more to her family’s past than she thought. Her ex-con neighbor, John Lincoln Bennett, seems to know a lot about it, which she soon learns has more implications for her heart than she ever could have imagined.

I received this book as an ARC, courtesy of Edelweiss. Light romance books hold a special place in my heart, as they were about the only thing available to keep a homeschooled adolescent growing up in a conservative Christian house during puberty sane. It’s been a while since I read one, so I was excited to be approved for this one.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It’s very well-written and both Jennifer and Lincoln’s character voices are very strong and engaging. I can identify with Jennifer’s character a lot, as I find myself exhibiting introverted tendencies and both dreading and craving the opportunity to go out and meet people. Jennifer is cooped up alone during the snowy season (reason enough not to want to venture out), but her neighbor, Lincoln, makes it his duty to make sure her driveway is shoveled, and no one bothers her or threatens her, and of course friendship, and then a romance, blooms from there.

There are some very endearing moments and some fun humor as well throughout the book. Shelley delivers a powerful message in that even ex-cons deserve second chances, and there is good to be found in people who have made mistakes. There’s also a nice dose of the opposite too, that there can be a lot of bad in people who have never gotten caught for theirs.

There’s even a cat named Clyde who I firmly believe is evil, but the author captured a strong character voice for Clyde too that managed to exert itself in the best of places, just like a cat would, with no apologies.

While I definitely see the good neighbor aspect of Lincoln’s actions, I felt on multiple occasions in the book that Lincoln was a bit pushy and condescending for my comfort, invading her personal space uninvited multiple times and just making her life his business without her consent. He even thinks a couple times that her naivete is attractive to him, which just screams misogynist. While we see from his perspective that he is very caring and has all the best intentions, he came off a bit controlling for my tastes.

There were a few threads in here too that didn’t seem fully fleshed out. Jennifer’s family is definitely a bit dodgy, there are a few things Jennifer finds as she is cleaning out the house and barn, and there are a few people who come into the story that are very brow-raising. These things seem to foreshadow some major reveals later on, but then they just kind of fizzle out and don’t go anywhere, which I found a little disappointing.

All in all, though, this book was very engaging, the characters are both strong, and it’s an immersive read. If you enjoy light romance with the protector/damsel trope, I think you will enjoy this one.

Edgewater Road is being published by Blackstone Publishing and is available for purchase tomorrow, 1 March!


View all my reviews

Happy Writing!

~MJ & Petey

Petey says hello!

ARC Review | Promise Broken – K’wan

Promise Broken follows a seventeen-year-old girl named Promise as she navigates a gang-controlled neighborhood where drugs and violence are part of the status quo. To survive, she must confront difficult choices that will shape her future for better or worse.

From the very first paragraph, I was captivated by this story. It begins with Promise in a sticky situation with her friend and the law, foreshadowing more conflict ahead when her aunt finds out what happened. And from there, Promise’s challenging life story and her limited options are showcased brilliantly and intimately in ways that made me both shudder and cheer her on. I was engrossed and invested in her and could not put this book down.

The narrative occasionally shifts to the perspective of Promise’s two friends, Mouse and Keys, showing how a life of drugs and crime can begin because of desperate situations and good intentions, which I thought was one of the most powerful threads in this book.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a bit disappointed by the ending. My only hope is that the author has a sequel planned, which is certainly probable given that most of K’wan’s books are part of a series, and there are a few threads in this book that Promise enough substance for an intriguing second book, so I will maintain hope and keep an eye out.

The ending wasn’t my biggest issue with this book, however. Every female character was sexualized to the point that none of them really contributed much to the plot besides being sexual objects for male characters.

I get that this is a real-world issue women face so it didn’t bother me right away, but I kept waiting for the author’s voice to come through in the narrative that sexualizing women is wrong, but I never got that sense. Even Promise, the main character, did not escape being viewed through this lens and her main arc revolved around her attraction to a guy who only sees value in women through sexual conquest. Promise even acknowledges this about him but doesn’t seem to mind that he’s sleeping around while actively pursuing her.

I did enjoy this book in spite of this issue. K’wan has a unique writing style that can reveal all the complexities of the situation to the reader without sounding boring or overdone. His characters, with their flaws and passions, are relatable and engaging, and you can’t help but want to know what happens to them, even when you wish you could leap through the pages and slap them at times.

K’wan’s Promise Broken will hit shelves on 15 March 2022 and is being published by Blackstone Publishing.

Happy Writing!

~MJ & Petey

Petey says hello!

Review | The Warrior Poet – by Sharon Lynn Fisher

Outlander. But better. Oh and it has magic. So way better.

This book follows the story of Neve, who lives in present day Portland Oregon, and William Butler Yeats, who lives in 19th century Ireland. Connected from a past life, they are reunited through magical forces, and must figure out how to stop the evil trying to take over Ireland, rediscovering themselves, and each other, along the way.

I wasn’t sure what to expect with this book, especially given that this is book 3 in the Faery Rehistory series, and I haven’t read the first two. But I was very pleasantly surprised by how engaged I was. I did not feel lost even once.

The main characters had very unique voices, which was refreshing, with excellent insertions of pop culture references (including Outlander) that were both humerous and situationally appropriate. I almost always knew who was speaking and was able to forge a relationship with these characters because of how well I came to know them through their consistent dialogue and behaviors.

Since this was book 3, I was expecting a lot of exposition. While there was some, it was done in a way that kept the story interesting, and revealed just enough that was relevant to this story, and nothing that wasn’t. And there weren’t pages and pages of it at the beginning, only 3 or 4 paragraphs scattered throughout 316 pages, introduced only when necessary for the current plot. So well done on this. Too many series books just rehash info from previous books that have nothing to do with the current narrative, and it’s very amateur. Fisher was expert here.

The magic was also very natural. This book explored reincarnation, Irish gods and goddesses and folklore, the poet William Butler Yeats (which I was skeptical about, but wrongly so), with a very intriguing and suspenseful build up to both the romantic encounter and the “big battle” at the end. Unlike some books, Fisher devoted about 60-80 pages to the climax, so I didn’t feel cheated at all. Her use of time travel was also very strategically done.

And the sex scenes…

🙂

Graphic and tasteful. Not overdone. Definitely not cringy like others I’ve read. They were also well placed in the story.

This book was a great read, and I’ll be adding book 1 and 2 to my reading list in the future and watching for more books by this very talented author. Sharon Lynn’s Fisher’s book The Warrior Poet from Blackstone Publishing, hits bookshelves on 12 October, and I highly recommend it!

Happy Writing!

~MJ

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