Tag Archives: science fiction

Class Heroes – Hearts and Minds by Stephen Henning #stephenhenning

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I have been with the Class Heroes by Stephen Henning since the beginning and am so happy to be back with them again. Lolly has become my favorite superhero because I have a love/hate relationship with her.

Hearts and Minds (Class Heroes #5)

Amazon / Goodreads

MY REVIEW

It has been a long time since I have been with the Class Heroes series by Stephen Henning. I have loved these teenage superheroes, watching them grown and learn about their powers and life in general.

Lolly is an exceptional character and has become my favorite. She is mean, evil, and now that she has a boyfriend, she is beginning to see things in a different light. She has the ability to control fire and I wonder what will become of her.

Her father, now I am not so sure he can be redeemed. He has the power to manipulate people int doing what he wants them to do. I wonder….does he use it on Lolly?

It’s been a while since Book IV, London Belong To the Alchemist, and Hearts and Minds picks up where it left off, and even though it has been some time, I had no trouble picking up where I left off.

There are moment of suspense where she is in serious danger, but, hey, she’s the main character. You wouldn’t kill her off, would you Stephen?

In Hearts and Minds, Lolly has reunited with her father after he spent nine months in prison. She struggles to find her own identity. I don’t trust the man at all, as they search for a missing girl who may have super powers.

Lolly, Lolly, Lolly….BEWARE! I feel a sense of danger, very subtle, yet always there and I don’t know who she can trust. The story doesn’t end here, so if we are looking for closure, we will have to wait.

I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of Hearts and Minds by Stephen Henning.

Animated Animals. Pictures, Images and Photos
4 Stars

GOODREADS BLURB

Sixteen-year-old Lolly Rosewood, the cold and calculating anti-hero from the Class Heroes series, is back in a new, thrilling and dangerous mission.
Lolly and her father, Sir Michael, are in Montana on the track of a kidnapped girl — Erica Barrington — who they believe has superpowers. But there are other people hunting for the missing girl. Can Lolly and her father find Erica in time?
This is the fifth book in the Class Heroes series. It’s a journey of discovery — and more secrets — for father and daughter. Lolly has always trusted her father implicitly, followed his orders, and shared his goal to reach out to other people with special abilities. This mission to Montana is a new experience for Lolly as she battles to shake off the shackles of being seen as a little girl in her father’s eyes, and establish a new relationship with him as an equal.
Warning: Contains Violence, Death, Sexual References, Dark Humour and some Upper Class British Snobbery 🙂

ABOUT STEPHEN HENNING

Stephen Henning

 I began writing the first Class Heroes book on my laptop in February 2011, but these stories have probably been continually playing in my head since I was aged five or six, when I would act them out with toys and with my friends. I then branched out into using pencils, colouring pens and paper, moving on to writing pads and then my first computer.

So, as you’ve probably gathered, I have always enjoyed making up stories and the super-hero genre has been one of my favourites.

The CV-type stuff is that I went to Sheffield Hallam University to study English. I then trained and briefly worked as a journalist in Salford. After that, I moved into publishing – which was great. An interesting and fun industry to be in and fascinating to see how books are put together and sold.

After that I started doing technical writing, which led me to start my own business with my friend and colleague Andrew Butters. My love of writing, generally, led me back to writing fiction. Our company, Elucidox Ltd, publishes the Class Heroes books.

If you want to know a bit more about me, what kind of super powers I have and the kind of super villains I have to tangle with on a daily basis, then feel free to watch Rage. This is a short film, that took a long time to make. It’s a simple day in my life :-). Actually it’s just a fun movie that I made with the very kind help of some of my best mates. We had a laugh doing it, hope you like it too. And if you do, then why not explore the super world of the Class Heroes books?

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Books From The Backlog – Resonance by A J Scudiere @ajscudiere #booksfromthebacklog

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Books from the Backlog is a fun way to feature some of those neglected books sitting on your bookshelf unread.  If you are anything like me, you might be surprised by some of the unread books hiding in your stacks.

If you would like to join in, swing by Carole’s Random Life in Books.

Right now, I have 2488 books on my Goodreads TBR. No matter how many books I read, the mountain grows taller and I am going through it…slowly. If I have the book, it stays, no matter what. I’m adding tags that I never even thought about doing at the time I added the book. It would have been so much easier if I had done it then.

Resonance

Amazon / Goodreads

GOODREADS BLURB

The shift is coming. Soon. Dr. David Carter knows this. However, he’s a geologist, so ‘soon’ means anywhere from tomorrow to a thousand years from now. People are dying. Now. Drs. Jordan Abellard and Jillian Brookwood are standing at the edge of SuperAIDS. Or are they? They won’t be able to figure it out if they can’t get some authorization signed – and soon. But they’re peons and no one is paying attention. Whole species died at the last polar shift. 65 million years ago. Right now Dr. Becky Sorenson has some seriously mutated frogs in her lab. In L.A. Bees are making abnormal columns on the side of the freeways. In Georgia, birds are migrating out of season. It all makes a sick kind of sense when the doctors consider that the last magnetic shift is strangely coincidental to the dinosaur die-out. And the only similarity in the problems today is that each is occurring in a ‘hotspot’ – a pocket of reverse polarity tells them all them all the shift is already here.

Goodreads rating: 4.04  ·  314 ratings  ·  63 reviews

I added this back on 10.2.12. This Amazon freebie has a cool cover. Reading the blurb again makes me feel this will be a good fit for me and I am really curious about the ‘shift.’

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The Forbidden Door by Dean Koontz @deankoontz #librarylove

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The Forbidden Door (Jane Hawk, #4)

Amazon / Audiobook / Goodreads

MY REVIEW

The Forbidden Door takes a wicked turn and proves that just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. Now the real Dean Koontz shows his face.

‘They’ have been unable to capture Jane. Even when they catch up to her, she is quick and manages to escape by the skin of her teeth. So…they have set their sites on her five year old son. I love the character that is introduced here…Cornell…is absolutely fabulous.

Dean Koontz brings his characters to life and I root for the good guys who lay it all on the line. Regardless of what could happen to them, they feel compelled to do the right thing.

This is the fourth book in the Jane Hawk series. I am so disappointed I will have to wait for the next one from the library, The Night Window, the finale. I have been binge reading them and I sooooo much want to know what happens next. This is a 5 book series and needs to be read in order. The books are looooong but I have been devouring them.

Animated Animals. Pictures, Images and Photos
4 Stars

GOODREADS BLURB

“We’re rewriting the play, and the play is this country, the world, the future. We break Jane’s heart, we’ll also break her will.”

She was one of the FBI’s top agents until she became the nation’s most-wanted fugitive. Now Jane Hawk may be all that stands between a free nation and its enslavement by a powerful secret society’s terrifying mind-control technology. She couldn’t save her husband, or the others whose lives have been destroyed, but equipped with superior tactical and survival skills—and the fury born of a broken heart and a hunger for justice—Jane has struck major blows against the insidious cabal.

But Jane’s enemies are about to hit back hard. If their best operatives can’t outrun her, they mean to bring her running to them, using her five-year-old son as bait. Jane knows there’s no underestimating their capabilities, but she must battle her way back across the country to the remote shelter where her boy is safely hidden . . . for now.

As she moves resolutely forward, new threats begin to emerge: a growing number of brain-altered victims driven hopelessly, violently insane. With the madness spreading like a virus, the war between Jane and her enemies will become a fight for all their lives—against the lethal terror unleashed from behind the forbidden door.

ABOUT DEAN KOONTZ

Acknowledged as “America’s most popular suspense novelist” (Rolling Stone) and as one of today’s most celebrated and successful writers, Dean Ray Koontz has earned the devotion of millions of readers around the world and the praise of critics everywhere for tales of character, mystery, and adventure that strike to the core of what it means to be human.

Dean R. Koontz has also published under the names Leigh Nichols, Brian Coffey, David Axton, Owen West, Deanna Dwyer and Aaron Wolfe.

Dean, the author of many #1 New York Times bestsellers, lives in Southern California with his wife, Gerda, their golden retriever, Elsa, and the enduring spirit of their goldens, Trixie and Anna.

Website

MY DEAN KOONTZ REVIEWS

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The Crooked Staircase by Dean Koontz @deankoontz #librarylove

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The Crooked Staircase by Dean Koontz is the third book in the Jane Hawk series.

The Crooked Staircase (Jane Hawk, #3)

Amazon / Audiobook / Goodreads

MY REVIEW

I have been binge reading the Jane Hawk series, checking them out from the library.

The danger increases for Jane Hawk. ‘They’ dog her every step. In this day of the digital footprint, she strives to stay off the grid, but even burner phones could lead to her destruction.

She finds some unlikely allies along the way, always on the run.

Jane Hawk is a character that hits all the high marks for me. To say she is strong is putting it mildly. It takes all the skills she possesses to stay one step ahead of those who want to take her down. She does not want to kill, but will do so when necessary. She plots and plans each step she takes, but when she has to make a quick decision, her mind quickly runs through her options and she commits to her course of action.

The books are loooooong and richly detailed. Sometimes I just wanted to skim through to get to the action, but as I walked…or ran…step by step with Jane, I felt it also increased my anticipation, knowing something wicked this way comes.

Animated Animals. Pictures, Images and Photos
4 Stars

GOODREADS BLURB

Jane Hawk — who dazzled readers in The Silent Corner and The Whispering Room — faces the fight of her life, against the threat of a lifetime in this electrifying new thriller by #1 New York Times bestselling suspense master Dean Koontz. “I could be dead tomorrow. Or something worse than dead.” Jane Hawk knows she may be living on borrowed time. But as long as she’s breathing, she’ll never cease her one-woman war against the terrifying conspiracy that threatens the freedom–and free will–of millions. Battling the strange epidemic of murder-suicides that claimed Jane’s husband, and is escalating across the country, has made the rogue FBI agent a wanted fugitive, relentlessly hunted not only by the government but by the secret cabal behind the plot. Deploying every resource their malign nexus of power and technology commands, Jane’s enemies are determined to see her dead . . . or make her wish she was. Jane’s ruthless pursuers can’t stop her from drawing a bead on her prey: a cunning man with connections in high places, a twisted soul of unspeakable depths with an army of professional killers on call. Propelled by her righteous fury and implacable insistence on justice, Jane will make her way from southern California to the snow-swept slopes of Lake Tahoe to confront head-on the lethal forces arrayed against her. But nothing can prepare her for the chilling truth that awaits when she descends the crooked staircase to the dark and dreadful place where her long nightmare was born.

ABOUT DEAN KOONTZ

Acknowledged as “America’s most popular suspense novelist” (Rolling Stone) and as one of today’s most celebrated and successful writers, Dean Ray Koontz has earned the devotion of millions of readers around the world and the praise of critics everywhere for tales of character, mystery, and adventure that strike to the core of what it means to be human.

Dean R. Koontz has also published under the names Leigh Nichols, Brian Coffey, David Axton, Owen West, Deanna Dwyer and Aaron Wolfe.

Dean, the author of many #1 New York Times bestsellers, lives in Southern California with his wife, Gerda, their golden retriever, Elsa, and the enduring spirit of their goldens, Trixie and Anna.

Website

MY DEAN KOONTZ REVIEWS

  • You can see my Giveaways HERE.
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Giveaway – An Outcast and An Ally by Caitlin Lochner @CaiLochner @XpressoTours

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An Outcast and an Ally
Caitlin Lochner
(A Soldier and a Liar #2)
Published by: Swoon Reads
Publication date: April 21st 2020
Genres: Dystopian, Science Fiction, Young Adult

Dark secrets and conflicting loyalties abound as four superpowered teens are torn apart by war in Caitlin Lochner’s An Outcast and an Ally, the epic YA sequel to A Soldier and a Liar.

Lai, Jay, Al, and Erik are on the run after the military accuses them of being traitors. Tensions between everyone are high, but they have to stick together if they want to survive. And somehow stop the war that’s now in full swing.

But when Erik returns to the rebels to find answers about his past, Lai, Al, and Jay have no choice but to go to the Order―a peace coalition bent on stopping the rebels and dissolving the enmity between gifted and ungifted. However, the longer the war drags on, the more Lai’s long-kept secrets threaten to destroy everything she’s ever worked for. Sparks fly as the team constantly questions whether they can trust one another and everyone tries to navigate a war that will change everything.

Filled with the same high-stakes superpowered action and complex relationships as A Soldier and A Liar, Caitlin’s first book, An Outcast and an Ally brings this story to a dramatic and satisfying close.

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EXCERPT

LAI 

Of the three rebels coming to meet us, Al dispatches the first easily with her halberd and keeps running to take care of those in front. She makes it look so effortless, so graceful, I’m almost jealous. She doesn’t even need her flames to dominate a battle. Jay and I tag-team the second rebel while the third goes for Peter.

Our opponent is thick with muscle and armed with a spear. She swings low, trying to trip up our footwork, but Jay throws one of his knives at her chest and she has to sidestep quickly to dodge it. I come in from her other side. She swings again, this time aiming for my stomach, and I fall back. Jay throws another knife, and she deflects it with her spear shaft. But he’d already started running at her as soon as he’d thrown it. He gets in close and thrusts one of his knives just under her rib cage. When she lifts her spear to try to plunge it into his back, I run my spear through her heart. She chokes and falls to her knees with a muffled sob.

I hope her death was as painless as possible. My stomach still turns every time I kill someone, especially after hearing so much about the rebels from Erik. But I can’t afford to hesitate. It could cost my friends’ lives. At least there’s no one Erik is close with on this raid.

I turn back to make sure Peter’s okay—just in time to see the third rebel’s sword narrowly miss his chest. Peter fumbles with his daggers. The rebel thrusts again. This time, he hits Peter’s arm. Deep. Blood immediately falls as Peter drops one of his daggers with a gasp.

I’m behind the rebel before he can attack again. He spins around to block my spear, but I caught him off guard. He doesn’t put enough strength behind it. My spear twists around his blade and sends it flying out of his grip before one of Jay’s knives finds its mark in his throat.

“Jay, give Al some backup,” I say. The words snap off my tongue. “I’ll stay with Peter.”

Author Bio:

I’m a nerd, traveler, and architecture enthusiast who worked as an assistant English teacher in Tokyo for three years before pursuing my MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Central Florida. I love reading and writing anything with magic, adventure, and complex found-family relationships. I can typically be found absorbed in books, games, or manga, or else obsessing over said books, games, and manga.

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