“This framework of bone protruded against his olive complexion like a demon attempting to escape its elastic cage.” This impeccably written simile demonstrates the incredible level of creative intelligence and literary skill one finds in the superb collection of short stories authored by James Musgrave...

In Andrea Downing’s romance, Always on My Mind, vegetarian hippie Cassie Halliday is heading for San Francisco’s Haight-Asbury when, during an evening in a bar in Jackson Hole, she meets Stetson-wearing cattle rancher Cooper Byrnes. Certainly, they would make an unlikely couple, yet, despite her...

The Silhouette by Andrew Van Dyk presents an early twentieth-century rural commune that is flourishing but hiding a dark secret. The first several chapters present the beautiful, serene, wooded setting beside a glittering lake. There are three three-story cabins, and we meet the residents; at...

Breaking Wicked by E.J. Nickson is the second romance novel from the Crooked Brook Ranch. Jacob "Trix" Doyle has worked at the farm for three years, making those that live there his family. He would do anything for them, especially his best friend, Winn. Katherine...

The Doomed: Volume 1 by Konstantin Devereaux is a sci-fi novel that explores the different facets of human behavior through its characters. After losing his parents to the Soviet regime at a tender age, child prodigy Alexander Sokolov grows up to become an accomplished scientist...

Up to this point, I’ve avoided COVID-related fiction as it has felt a bit too close for comfort. These are, as the now popular word describes, unprecedented times. And America knows this only too well. But relying on snippets of news once an evening, I...

Vestige: Fathers and Daughters is the sixth installment of Ellen C. Maze's The Rabbit Saga. Sixteen years after the events of 11/13, Elder Rakum Canaan leads a fulfilling life raising his teenage daughters, Kelly Meade and Shebah, alongside his loving wife, Chloe. But the unexpected...

Where Irises Never Grow by Paulette Mahurin is a historical fiction novel set during World War II in France. When Monica finds two names on a slip of paper inside a French version of Aesop’s Fables while working on her dissertation, she embarks on a...

Wunderland by Scarlett Se Leva is your standard “poor girl-rich boy” fall in love against the odds and spend their lives fighting their families’ rejection of the idea. Simone, it seems, has known Ryan Mulligan her entire life and has loved him for most of...

Nefertiti's Legacy: A Lost Pharaoh Chronicles Complement by Lauren Lee Merewether was a great read for me and a wonderful adventure to Egypt of the era of pharaohs. In the tradition of Christian Jacq, Merewether comes across as not only a gifted storyteller, but an...