Review Good Sister, Bad sister

 Good Sister, Bad Sister

The Heart of the Staff, Book 1

 Carol Marrs Phipps and Tom Phipps

 Reviewed by Roy Murry, Author

This delightful tale of yore, if there ever was a place, is presented in a colorful setting. Relatives, families, siblings, and royalty are the same throughout history, even if some of them are wizards, witches, dragons, or birds, as it is in this novel.

In the Phipps’ fictitious land, there is a clear-cut divide between good and evil. One sister is the child any mother or father would love, where the other sister is the one you would like to take out in the woods a hit with the strap. But this is not what you do with a witch that can travel at will through thin air.

The story is about disagreements going back before time began. This family dynamic pits brother against brother, a daughter against mother, and sister against sister. The way they resolve their differences make this fun read.

Now, who do you know can turn his brother into a dragon because he has been a bad boy? Or, when was the last time you heard a sister be jailed in her own kingdom by using wards, whatever they are.

The language HITS on a new but easy to follow vocabulary that won’t hinder your train of thought. You’ll have a few chuckles out of hearing a crow’s wife talk to him about his business and how he’ll get the next meal.

This first book in a series was well thought out, and I recommend it to the fun-loving reader. I enjoyed it much.

Series only Paperback: https://amzn.to/35VrPjb

Life is a Circus Run by a Platypus

Review of
Life is a Circus Run by a Platypus

Written by Allison Hawn

Reviewed by Author Roy Murry

Ms. Hawn’s Circus is a collection of well put together little acts formed during her exciting life. I believe that she has learned her life lessons, according to her summaries at the end of each episode after the curtain comes down.

Those experiences came after trials and errors young adults go through growing up. Her writing brings out the funny side and or positive side of the situations she muddles through.

The situations she-devils in are enjoyable to read and seemed to be geared to lessons for the young but do have some universal axioms en-grained. Using comic references to popular and not so popular characters and events, she gets her points across colorfully, bringing the reader to a pause where they will contemplate what just transpired.

Funny most of the time, but sad in some instances, Allison tells it like it is in her writing. She doesn’t hold back any punches. She gives her interpretation of what transpired in her life.

This is not a book to read at one session, but a collection to be read one story at a time. The reader can go back many times for a laugh.

I have earmarked a few for reread, a laugh, and reference in my storytelling.

Purchase: http://amzn.to/2w4mwwF

Review of Wrong Place Wrong Time

Review of Wrong Place Wrong Time

Written by David P Perlmutter

Reviewed by Author Roy Murry

When we were young, our thought processes sometimes got confused either by lack of knowledge, by our emotions, or by some drug-induced states we put ourselves in. It was our up bring that brought us back to reality and got us through those befuddled state of affairs.

In Mr. Perlmutter’s Wrong Place Wrong Time, David is just about to mature into an executive with all his future laid out for him. Working hard in a profession he enjoys, an error in judgment he makes leads to the disruption of that life, leaving him on the outside looking in.

To comfort himself, he goes to a Spanish resort area to get away from it all and to reorganize his thinking, looking for a new future. All is going well for a short period of time until more conflict enters his life. What is one to do – go with the flow even if it is not where you want to go?

David does that but lands where no one wants to be in a foreign country – on the wrong side of the law because he thought he was doing the right thing. And no one was listening, other than his family back home.

This true story by the author has some misadventures to get into detail. What I will say is that David did the right thing in coming clean with his family, thereby freeing him from any guilt and allowing him to go forward with his life albeit not being a rosy situation.

The story was well written and gripping. It was somewhat of a cliffhanger at times that the reader will keep on going until the end. Good job for David P. Perlmutter’s first endeavor.

I have also read his My Way and got some great tips on marketing a book on the internet. Thank You, David. We have many of the same friends.

Amazon: https://amzn.to/2QbVEpz

Review of What It Takes

Review of WHAT IT TAKES,

Author Terry Tyler

Reviewed by Author Roy Murry

“Love goes by haps; Some Cupid kills with arrows, some with traps” Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing. 

Ms. Tyler’s contemporary drama weaves an intellectual story of love on many different levels. Some are common and up front and others are hidden behind the masks people use when courting the person they desire.

Deep seated emotions motivate the main character’s mating rituals. Karen, the youngest of three sisters, is looking for her ideal man, but falls for a common man, who doesn’t quote Shakespeare. Doubts run a muck in her over educated head with underdeveloped security issues, which leads to a break up.

Her lover, Danny, one good looking bloke, is broken up over the matter and tries his best to put their love affair back together. He and all the on-lookers can’t understand Karen’s attitude.

His strengths are not what she is looking for. She is looking for the perfect image of what she wants and he may be closer than one would think.

This is where the underlying current takes over the story that will keep the reader wondering what is going on. Will they get back together? Both hope they will at different times in their break up, giving each some comfort in that they may return to their loving ways.

But is cupid shooting arrows in the wrong direction or are there traps being set to control the situation. You’ll only find out by reading What It Takes, a well written relationship drama.

If you looking for a romantic drama that will keep your mind entertained with emotional twists, I recommend this novel for a weekend read at the beach.

See Terry's interview with links below: http://bit.ly/1gMlQ0z

Review of FRENZY

Review of FRENZY,

A Daniel Jones Story

Written by Mark King

Reviewed by Author Roy Murry

“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” And he did this in the beginning.

In Mark King’s novel, we find a young man, Daniel, and a young woman, Gwendolyn with her elderly friend Mary, living in a state of wildly uncontrollable activity in the beginning of a new world order ruled by a god of another kind. This came about because Daniel is a wanted man by controlling despotic creatures, who govern the world with overpowering weaponry and Utopian lies – at forty years old you will be given your rewards for following our rules.

Living in a peaceful agrarian society, Daniel uncovers a secret about the Lords of the world and breaks one of their commandments. Punishment is death.

Running from those rulers, he meets the women dual who change his beliefs of what the world is, was, or should be. The adventure begins and where it ends depends on their endeavors.

A fast pace read, FRENZY, is a different kind of dystopian novel, in that the human element is fully accentuated. Humans are treated as spirits. Example: The ruler’s hunters capture and are ready to kill Daniel’s group. He and Gwendolyn overcome them; and Mary convinces them to let the hunters live because they are human, albeit misguided.

This novel is an excellent beginning of a man’s journey to freedom. The reader has an ending that entices him into Daniel’s future adventures.

Lastly, Mr. King’s imaginative immaculate prose was a pleasure to read.   

Review of STEPS TO HEAVEN

Review of Wendy Cartmell’s

STEPS TO HEAVEN

Reviewed by Author Roy Murry

Ms. Carmell’s writing kept me involved with the events of the first in her series: A Sgt. Major Crane novel. It would seem to some that the novel was a military war story, but it isn’t.  

This novel is an after the war entanglement where a military police detective, Crane, has to unravel a deadly problem - the physiological effects of soldiers returning from war in a state of vulnerability. ‘Not a whodunit, but a why did they do it,’ is the premise of Crane’s investigation.

When one soldier murders in an unorthodox way, Crane wants to follow after the why, but his Commanding Officer delays the investigation. It happens again and then another time at other military posts. Crane is now given the go ahead to find out the reason why a veteran could do what he did to another family member.

This is a detective story with a military background and red tape influences of both the military and civilian authorizes. Sgt. Major Crane, a hard nose senior investigator, wants to get the religious manipulator who he thinks provoked the crimes against veterans; and dam the rules that are slowing up his investigation. His mindset, not others, rules the day in the end at a high cost.

Ms. Cartwell’s novel is a plausible contemporary murder entanglement that detective lovers will enjoy. Her characters come across as humans not super intelligent spoofs. They have lives interwoven into the story that military police officers have to contend with. This novel has a thrilling ending to boot.

Wendy’s interview is below: http://bit.ly/1bFrynH

  

                 

Review of Deadly Attraction

Review of Neil Low’s

DEADLY ATTRACTION

Reviewed by Author Roy Murry

When it comes to a good moving detective story, I look for a fast moving adventure into the lives of the ones doing the detecting and the mysteries they are trying to unravel. Neil Low makes that endeavor entertaining, expounding on all the emotions.

His story is simple: women found dead and someone did it but whom? This is where the fun begins. The fun is not the violent act but in this case - the attractions. It’s in the DEADLY ATTRACTION of a man against women and the attractions of the two detectives unraveling the details of why the woman is dead.

Because of the woman’s attraction to a man with a questionable background, she meets her maker at an early age. Mr. Low’s Vera and Alan detective couple’s attraction to each other becomes a deadly factor towards the thrilling end of this whodunit.

Seattle is Mr. Low’s home where he works as a police officer and is the reason for that city being the background of the novel. I’ve found that’s good to write about what you know. He knows Seattle, and from what I read in his books he is an excellent detective.

Using simple prose, Neil has his characters Vera and Alan giving each other humorous, loving jabs. With the help of police detective Ben, they go about solving two cases that clash at the end into one, on a tugboat no doubt.

If you like a good moving fun-filled thriller, DEADLY ATTRACTION should be in your Book to read list.    

Purchase: http://amzn.to/1IuRti3