Tag Archives: self published

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Book Review: Escaping Wonderland, by Tiffany Roberts

I received a copy of Tiffany Roberts’ Escaping Wonderland in a monthly Renegade Romance book box.

escaping wonderland coverAlice knows Wonderland is just a virtual world operated inside an asylum to which she’s been wrongfully committed, but she can’t find her way out—can’t find her way back to the life she lived before she woke beneath titanic trees and towering flowers. With the terrifying Red King searching for her and chaos all around, her only hope of escape lies in Shadow, a tall, mysterious being with glowing eyes, sharp claws, and a haunting grin who may be the maddest of them all.

But even if Wonderland isn’t real, her growing feelings for Shadow—and his desire for her—are. Can Alice and Shadow escape Wonderland together, or will she succumb to the madness like everyone else?

my review

Meh, it was merely ok. Shadow was marvelous in all of the ways: noble, loyal, fiercely protective, and brokenly sweet. But everything (and everyone) else in the book was mediocre. The villains were incredibly shallow and cliched, with no discernible motivation beyond being men and therefore power-hungry sexual predators; all played at exactly the same note. There basically weren’t any other women beyond in passing, and it’s inferred that they were all “dollies,” faceless victims, or sex slaves. (As I said, cliched.) Worst of all, Alice was absolutely useless. She just floated through the book, going with the flow and displaying no meaningful agency of her own. Other than inspiring the hero to an act of heroism, she didn’t even participate in her own rescue. I continued reading for Shadow. I was intensely bored by every other aspect of the book.
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@thebiblioaddict ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 🍄 #thebiblioaddict #fyp #booktok #bookrecommendations #bookreview #escapingwonderland #tiffanyroberts #indieauthorsoftiktok ♬ Blackbird – Acoustic Guitar Revival

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Book Review: Nocturnal, by Clio Evans

I picked up a copy of Nocturnal by Clio Evans as an Amazon freebie at some point in the not-too-distant past.

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I was his toxic obsession. He was my sadistic monster.

Nora:

When I took a job at St. Thorns university as a psychology professor, I encountered something—someone—unexplainable. Fascinating. And deadly.

Alec Briar had the eyes of a killer.

He’s a botanist who would rather rot in his greenhouse alone than deal with students, professors, or me. When a monster stalks me, our relationship becomes corrupted in ways that bring us closer together, for better or worse. He has secrets—ones that will destroy him if he discovers the truth…

Our minds twist to protect our souls, and Alec’s is the most warped of all. The only way to save him is to hurt him and accept the damnation doing so will bring.

Alec:

She was deadlier than belladonna, and yet I cannot resist her.

Nora Woulfe has become my infatuation. As she pushes me to my breaking point, we spiral down a path that will be our downfall. A monster is trying to steal what is mine, and I will hunt him to the bitter end. Even if I have to use her to draw him out…

my review

This was a lot of fun. It’s not super deep or complicated. It’s cotton candy. But I went in expecting two (maybe three) chaos grimlins being chaotic, and the book delivered just that. I liked Nora a lot as a character and could relate to her frustration with society’s men. I appreciated Alec and Monster, too, though “likable” isn’t a description I could apply to them. I did find a lot of the narrative repetitive. The reader is told the same thing several times. Or maybe characters just keep thinking the same thing over and over, which makes sense for the obsessed. But it felt redundant to read. And there is a character who is trusted at the end, but I saw absolutely no reason why they should be more trustworthy than anyone else. All in all, however, I enjoyed this.

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Book Review: Splintered Path, by W.R. Gingell

I contributed tothe Kickstarter campaign for a copy of W.R. Gingell‘s Splintered Path. It is book 4 of the Shattered World series, and I have been reading/reviewing them as they come out.

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Viv thought that her life was gaining some sort of equilibrium.

Yeah, there’s something dodgy in her family tree, and yeah, she’s living in a magic Tea House in Melbourne that has fae residents and feathered-and-or-tentacled visitors; but at least she’s starting to get the hang of it. She’s been keeping an eye on her not-quite-sane and perennially murderous co-worker Luca (while convincing him not to kill quite everyone who looked at him sideways), getting closer to her mysterious and probably-fae-royalty boss Jasper, and catching humans and behindkind causing trouble between the worlds.

But now one of her house-mates has kissed her—and she may have accidentally kissed him back. Romance wasn’t meant to be a part of Viv’s new life at the Tea she’s still just trying to figure out how her mother connected with the world in which Viv now lives, and making sure she doesn’t get killed either outside or inside the Tea House. She would also settle for just figuring out what her father is hiding from her and why he has what he has in his safe at home. She doesn’t have the bandwidth for romance as well.

Meanwhile, outside the Tea House, the “men” from Forex have begun to take a closer interest in her…

my review

As always, I enjoyed this new installment of the Shattered World series. I laughed frequently at Gingell’s (and the characters’) dry delivery of lines, enjoyed the small cameo-like references to characters from other books/series, and was caught up in the mystery. However, there was significantly less interaction between the main characters and less forward progression on the larger series-level plot arc than I might have liked. I suppose I could describe my complaint as the whole thing just feeling very middle-book; something to get through to get forward. All in all, I didn’t love it as much as previous books, but I still very much enjoyed it.

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