The Girl In The Time Machine, by Debra Chapoton

"The Girl in the Time Machine" is a story with a macabre and tragic twist. As with all good time travel stories it weaves itself back and forward through the timelines of the main characters until you think your head will explode. I can't tell you more than that without huge spoilers.
It's also about growing up and learning the hard way how to deal with anger, jealousy and teenage dilemmas. Laken and Skylar, sometimes known as Lake and Sky have a bond that goes beyond friendship. When things get weird, and they do, we find out just how far that friendship is willing to go and why.
I'm honored to have been asked to review this novel. I give it four out of five stars because I can't decide if I liked the ending or not (and I try to be stingy with my stars) but I have no hesitation in recommending it as a great read. It's full of surprises at every turn and it kept me reading right along. I finished it in one sitting, to the detriment of my housekeeping.

Miss Match, by Lindzee Armstrong

Lindzee has some great offers to introduce her new book. Check it out.

MISS MATCH is finally here! I'm so excited to share the rest of Brooke and Luke's story with the world. To celebrate, it's on sale for $0.99 this week only. Sale ends May 10th!

  About MISS MATCH Billionaire CEO Luke Ryder doesn’t want to hire his best friend, Brooke, as his matchmaker. Not when he’s been in love with her for eight years. Too bad she doesn’t see him as relationship material and is engaged to another man. If the matchmaking company she works for closes, Brooke is out of a job, and Luke is out a best friend. There will be nothing stopping her from moving to Italy with her fiancé. And Luke isn’t about to let that happen. Brooke’s dream career may be crumbling, and she will do anything to keep Toujour in the black. Even recruit Luke, America’s favorite bachelor, as her next client. Surely his perfect smile and swollen bank account will send clients swarming to their doors. But when matching up Luke works a little too well, Brooke wonders if she’s with the right man. Maybe she should finally forget Luke’s playboy image and admit he’s changed. All Brooke has to decide is if she’s willing to risk her heart. Excerpt from MISS MATCH Brooke focused on her laptop screen. “I already filled in all the basics for you—name, age, occupation, that sort of thing. Hope you don’t mind.” Luke put a hand to his chest in mock horror. “I thought only a client could fill out this questionnaire. Isn’t that what you told me last night?” She rolled her eyes. “I can delete it all and we can start over.” “No, no.” He sniffed dramatically. “I can tell you’re trying to get rid of me as quickly as possible.” And there he was—a glimpse of the old Luke. Brooke grinned. Maybe this matchmaking thing would be good for him after all. “Okay, first question. What qualities are you looking for in a partner?” “Oh, that’s easy. Someone hot.” Brooke burst out laughing. “And what exactly is your definition of ‘hot?’” “I’m looking at it.” Brooke’s laughter died. Her cheeks heated, and she looked away. “Be serious.” “I am.” “Luke, you can’t tell me I’m hot.” “Why not? It’s true.” “Well, because . . .” Because Antonio would hate it. Because I’m glad you find me attractive. “Because I’m engaged.” Luke raised an eyebrow. “Being engaged doesn’t diminish your hotness. It’s not like there’s a rule against complimenting you.” “Maybe there should be.” Her heart pounded. “We don’t want to mess up our lucky number fourteen by adding another rule.” “Fourteen isn’t a lucky number.” “Relax, Brooke.” Luke motioned to her laptop. “Honestly, I want someone compassionate. Someone loyal. I want a girl who cares more about others than she cares about herself. Someone who likes me for me and not for my money.” “That’s a pretty generic answer.” He shrugged. “I could make up something better.”  


 Because I'm so excited about this book--and to celebrate Mother's Day--the short prequel novella, Meet Your Match, will be FREE on kindle from May 6th - May 10th. So you can get both the novella and novel for less than a dollar, this week only! Get your copies before the prices go up! And I hope you enjoy Brooke and Luke's story. To find out about future releases in the No Match for Love series, sign up for my newsletter on my website! website | Facebook | Amazon Author Central | Goodreads | Pinterest

Norma's Review:

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

Brook and Luke are best friends and that is all Brook will allow. She set the rules back in high school and has kept them ever since. Besides, she could never trust him, especially now that his dad has died and he's let himself become rather a mess. Too much drinking and women, and too little attention to business.

Brook is doing well in her chosen profession of matchmaker for a world based matchmaking service. In fact she has even found herself the perfect match. Antonio is the one for her.
Luke, however, has never given up loving Brooke and once he gets his life back on track he makes his play to win her over. Brook, the top matchmaker, now has to decide if she is truly supposed to marry Antonio or if she mismatched.

Content: (Keep in mind that I am prudishly strict in my ratings.) There are no sex scenes but it is implied that she sleeps with her fiance and that that is normal and acceptable.There is also lot of drinking and it makes it seem that Luke can just go from being an alcoholic to sober with out any problem, which I find unrealistic.
The book is well written, so laying these things aside, I give it 4 out of 5 stars.

Review: White Plume by Niki Gamm

White Plume is a little different than the normal books I read. It’s a young adult historical thriller set in the Ottoman Empire during the 1716.

Twelve year old Charles Henby and his father are sent on an errand by the “real” king of England to take a letter to the sultan enlisting his help in regaining the throne.
His father is killed and Charles is caught up in the battle between the Ottomans and the Austrians for control of the Balkans. He is taken to the sultan’s court where he becomes a favorite. However, he is still determined that the sultan receive the letter that he and his father were commissioned to deliver. Can he survive this strange culture with it’s strict and deadly rules long enough to fulfill his commission?

Reading White Plume gave me insight into a part of history that I was not familiar with. I think it has merit, not only as a story but as an enjoyable history lesson. The Author, Niki Gamm, has obviously done a great deal of research into the Ottoman cultures of the time. The only complaint might be that it is a little too heavy on the history, but that is more a personal opinion.

The writing is easy to read, though it seems a little stilted at times. It could be that, as it was actually written in Turkey, the differences in language have influenced the meter. It was annoying at first but as it went on it rather added to the feel of the story. The boy had to learn to speak the language at court. Intentional or not, the formal, chopped, sentences worked okay. There were however some awkward sentences that didn’t work and a few things that the editors missed. These however did not distract all that much from the story.

White Plume is newly released in the United States and I’m pleased to be a part in it’s unveiling.

A little bit about the author:

1. Tell me a little about yourself; anything fun or goofy that we should know? 

What a challenge! Tell me a little about yourself. How do I shorten 72 years in a paragraph? I’m a rebel, but of the old school. My first act of rebellion was apparently staged at age 2.5 or 3 when I slipped out the front gate of our home in Seattle and was found half a block away watching a mother bird feeding her young in a tree. The family I was adopted into thought men went to college and women became were store clerks or stayed at home so I got a Ph.D. Tourist traveling was for retirement years in the family so as soon as I got a driver’s license and my own car at age 18 I took off to see friends in L.A. and four years later went on the “Grand Tour” of Europe by myself.  Somewhere along the line I fell in love with Turkey and in particular, Istanbul. Now I’ve spent more than half my life there, nearly 35 years as a journalist, although I’ve maintained contact with friends in Seattle. As you can probably discern, I love challenges (time limits, new and different subjects for example) and change for better or worse.

2. Where do you live and what is it like to live there?

As for where I live, I have an apartment in the center of Istanbul in an area called Cihangir, not on the historic peninsula with its “Old City” Byzantine and Ottoman buildings. Cihangir was full of gardens and orchards and wooden mansions in the 19th century but now is covered with apartment buildings along a hill from which you can see the Bosphorus Straits, Sea of Marmara and the Old City.  Although Istanbul has shopping malls and large supermarkets, my area has lots of small mom-and-pop stores, fast food outlets, butcher shops, pharmacies, repair shops and the like with all of them willing to do home deliveries without an extra charge. Even the veterinarians will send someone to pick up one of my cats if necessary. If a delivery isn’t too heavy, you just lower a basket from your window.  We even have garbage pickup five or six times a day.

3. Tell me bit about your family/home life (if you don’t mind).

These days I write a column once a week for the daily newspaper where I’ve worked for more than 30 years and that’s quite different from the 24/7 life as a news reporter for a daily paper.  I’m single and I share my third floor apartment with nine cats – there used to be more. It’s quite large so I’m rarely bothered by them unless they need cuddling or are hungry and what’s available doesn’t suit them.  There’s a green area in back without cars or dogs so they’re free to roam there. Two or three of them have figured out how to get down to the street in front of our building and will sit there crying very loudly until someone lets them in and I find them pawing at my door. When they let me, I monitor news reports, keep up on my e-mail correspondence, translate from Turkish to English for friends, write articles for the paper in addition to my column and work on / think about the several writing projects I have in mind, including a second and third follow-up to White Plume, which will shortly be up on Amazon. I also, with a Turkish friend, write a website (www.theottomanfiles.com) click here for link which is a blend of information and a blog.

4. Why do you write? What do you write? Do you have any weird writing habits? (I know that's three questions; just tell me about your writing.)

When I was young, I used to write little scenarios or mostly dream them up without committing them to paper.  Since those were the days before television, I used comic books to stimulate my imagination or novels. Then my rebellion took me into academia with its quite different style of writing and eventually journalism. I kept my imagination to myself for the most part until a serious health scare made me aware of the passing time.  So I felt I should commit some of the more recent scenarios to paper and see about sharing them with others. I first wrote a trilogy, set in southwestern Wyoming about half way between Cody and Rock Springs which is still hibernating on my computer and then White Plume.  If there’s anything peculiar about my writing, it’s that I do my first draft by hand in spite of my arthritis – blank, unlined white paper and a fine-point pen, one page a day regardless of other commitments.  I don’t prepare an outline for my story but they’re fiction set in historical periods so the frame is already there.


(A note of interest to me here was that Niki has written a trilogy set between Cody and Rock Springs WY as I live in Cody and my newly released book is set in the badlands of WY. What a small world we live in to have such a connection to someone half way across the globe.) I've enjoyed meeting Niki online. What an interesting person, a true free spirit.

Look for White Plume at:
The White Plume on Amazon

Review: The Crystal Bridge, the Lost Shards, Book One by Charlie Pulsipher

My only criticism of this book is that it ends with a cliffhanger. Now I have to get my hands on the next book, fast. Ahhhhhh! Charlie Pulsipher, how can you do this to me?

At first I had a little trouble getting all the characters into my head because this is one of those epic books where several different stories are playing along beside each other. I often hate that, but in this case it was worth it because all of the stories were equally interesting. Once I got past the several beginnings, getting to know the characters in each thread I became very much enthralled in the stories.

I don’t want to put out any spoilers here, but the basics of the story revolve around a young boy named Kaden who has a secret power to travel between worlds, a girl name Aren who can see into peoples memories and a man named James who is involved with a dark, underground science project that has untold mysterious possibilities.

Put them all together with a lurking, godlike evil presence and you have the beginning of a story that will draw you in and keep you reading into the wee hours on a school night.

I recommend this book to readers young adult and up, boys, girls, men, women, anyone can enjoy this book. It also gets my G rating approval. 5 out of 5 stars

Note: I have now read the next book and it ties up all the ends very nicely, thank you Charlie.

About the author:

1. Tell me a little about yourself. Anything fun or goofy that we should know?

I'm a huge biology nerd who loves woodworking, art, and funny television shows. I'm a writer. That probably makes me goofy right off the bat, but I also built a teardrop trailer from scratch and I do a mean velociraptor impression. It has been know to make grown men and women scream and hide behind large vehicles.

2. Where do you live and what is it like to live there?

I live in St. George, Utah. It's one of the most beautiful places you will ever see, stunning red cliffs, crystal blue skies, majesty and more majesty. You just have to ignore the fact that it turns into the molten underbelly of Hades every summer. No matter how hot it gets, you never have to shovel sunshine, and that makes me pretty happy. I also enjoy the hiking and camping at my fingertips year round.

3. Tell me a bit about your family/home life (if you don't mind).

My wife and I have one neurotic dog that is literally afraid of his own shadow, vacuum cleaners, other dogs, people, exercise balls, and our yellow clothes hamper. He goes by Mahoney, Moopers, Honzers, Moopy, and Nugget. We spend a lot of time watching well-written television and reading when I'm not puttering around my garage.

4. Why do you write? What do you write? Do you have any weird writing habits? (I know that's 3 questions; just tell me about your writing.)

I write because I love creating something from nothing with something as intangible as words. Serious, these little letters that appear on the screen as I type are just photons that represent sounds. Can you get any more insubstantial than that? Yet, words are how we create and paint our realities. I will never stop loving these sorcerous abilities. I write science fiction, fantasy, the combination of the two, zombie humor, and health and fitness articles. It's a weird mix, I know. My day job is as a copywriter for a plant-based supplement company and then I tinker with my own stories when I get home. I don't know if I have weird writing habits. I suppose spend a lot of time not actually writing, but dreaming up scenes, conversations, histories, and just letting my characters play in my head. Anyone watching me would think I was just a lazy guy who likes laying on the couch and staring at the ceiling for hours, but I'm writing.

Links where you can find more of Charlies books:

The Crystal Bridge, the Lost Shards, Book One

Obsidian Threads, The Lost Shards Book 2

Zombies at the Door: Planning for the Inevitable

Book Review: Book Of Immortals: Canidate by Kassandra Lynn

Candidate, is the second in a series. To read my review of the first book see: My review of Book of Immortals Disciple for Online Book Club

I really enjoy a book where the bad girl is seeking redemption. Preserving her soul in a crystal pendant, Shann lies dead for almost one hundred years in an apparatus that has preserved her mortal remains.
She is not the only thing that has been preserved however, her child, still in the womb is still alive. Her former master, not knowing he is the father of the baby girl removes the child and takes it as his own. He hangs Shann's pendant on the baby's neck.
This allows Shann to go out among others, to find a suitable body that she can take over.
Her spirit watches over her daughter, Eadon, for a time and she has a connection with her. Her daughter would be a candidate for her soul to intrude but she would never do that. However, through the connection that her daughter has with her the master becomes aware that she is trapped in the pendant.
He sends the pendant out to find its way to others. Eventually it comes in contact with someone that is suitable, who is also evil enough that she has no qualms about taking over his body, changing it to suit her own needs and then, because the body belongs to a devil cult leader, she has to escape and find her way back to the immortals she cares for.
She later joins a quest to find the Book of Immortals. The devils also want the book, and war ensues when it is found. Shann, who has not been able to completely annihilate the devil she shares a body with is sometimes taken over by him. In the end, well, no spoilers from me. Read the book if you want to know how it ends.
I give the book four out of five stars, you know I'm stingy with stars so that's a good score. It's reasonably clean though not squeaky, the magics are sound and well thought out. I recommend this book to fantasy readers from older young adults and up.


A bit about the Author: (this is always my favorite part)


1. Tell me a little about yourself. Anything fun or goofy that we should know?

I grew up reading stories in both English and Chinese.  The structure behind fiction and the roles each characters play had intrigued me since I was a child.  Somehow, I like many of the antagonists and minor characters more than some of the protagonists—perhaps because the antagonists are the ones with the more interesting traits and strong personality?  In my writing, I want to incorporate some of the things I like about minor characters into my protagonists.  My protagonists are not always good in the traditional perspectives—some of them might be downright evil and selfish—but they're the ones I like to read about.  I hope you find them interesting too.

2. Where do you live and what is it like to live there?

I live in Vallejo, CA where the weather is always nice.  The town is not huge, but it's close to major cities and recreational areas.

3. Tell me a bit about your family/home life (if you don't mind).

I live with my husband and a sister who is my first beta reader.


4. Why do you write? What do you write? Do you have any weird writing habits? (I know that's 3 questions; just tell me about your writing.)

I like to make up stories in my head when I lie on my bed at night—it's like telling myself a bedtime story.  But thinking about something in my mind can be very disorganized and illusive.  I want to put them down in writing to make them more concrete and to share my fantasy with others.

I like to read and write fantasy and romance.  My finished books include "Book of Immortals: Disciple" and "Book of Immortals: Candidate."  I'm currently working on the third book in the series.

I have so many new concepts I want to write about after finishing the Book of Immortals series.  It's hard to choose which one to do first!

I don't think I have any weird writing habits unless if you consider the fact that I never know where the plot is going to turn until it does.

Kassandra Lynn's Web Page

Book of Immortals: Disciple

Book of Immortals: Candidate

A Perfect Victim by Patricia Dusenbury

I'm so glad I agreed to review this book. It was well worth the time. It was so good, I feel guilty having received a free copy.
I give A Perfect Victim 5 out of 5 stars, and I'm normally very stingy with stars.
I haven't read a lot of mysteries lately, I got bored with them years ago because so many of them seemed to follow a formula and were too predictable to be fun. This book however, kept me glued to my seat from cover to cover.
I won't recap the book, because it's a mystery and nobody wants spoilers with those. I will however say that the characters seemed very real and the situations they were in were very believable. The main character is a widow woman who suffers panic attacks. An underlying theme of the book is how she works her way out of being the helpless emotional cripple and becomes the strong woman she really is. She becomes one of the main suspects in a murder, and when she tries to find the culprit herself she gets herself in even deeper. Through her trials, she comes to grips with her personal demons.
I would recommend this book to readers from young adult up. It does elude to some bad life situations but there is nothing graphic. It does have a couple of foul words coming out of the mouth of one character, but I'm sure kids hear worse in school.
It looks like this book is the first of a series. I'm going to have to make time to read the next one and will be waiting to see the third come out.

About the author:

Patricia Dusenbury was one of those children who snuck a flashlight into bed and read mystery stories under the covers ‘til the wee small hours.  Despite this, she managed to acquire a degree in economics and a job that required writing as well as reading.  Now she’s become a writer, hoping to atone for those economic reports and analyses by writing stories that people read for pleasure. Uncial Press e-published A Perfect Victim in 2013 and Secrets, Lies & Homicide in 2014. A House of Her Own is scheduled for release in September,

In answer to some questions I asked her she replied:

After a lifetime on the east coast, I now live on one of the steepest hills in San Francisco - and only a block from the school where one of my grandchildren is in kindergarten.    I've always been an avid reader, especially mysteries, and writing them seemed the natural next thing.


To read more about her books and maybe get one, check out her Amazon Author page

Coincidence, by Danette J. Hansen

I'm having fun already with my new series of book reviews. To start with I read something I would probably have never gotten around to reading otherwise. I haven't read a mystery of any sort for quite some time and I can't say I've ever read a genealogical mystery before. Following is my review as posted on Goodreads.

Coincidence by Danette J. Hansen
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

A historical, genealogical mystery, this book is set in Holland during World War II. Is is clear that the author did her research. I learned, in a pleasant way, about that era in Holland's history.

The book is two stories in one, a modern day romance and a family history mystery. Both stories were delightful and the transition between the two worked well. It is tied together as well by the family link of Annaliese and her great aunt. There is also a rather awkward love triangle that livens things up.

Annaliese has gone to Holland to be part of a research team that studies the hybridization of plants. When she arrives, she boards with a woman who leads her into the shadows of the past and that is where the mystery begins.

If you have ever had the genealogy bug you have probably experienced the feeling that one of your ancestors is trying to tell you something. Annaliese goes beyond that, having visions and hearing voices. Sometimes making the solving of the mystery seem a little too convenient, but I didn't mind that, the journey was fun enough that I believed it.

The only reason I didn't give the book a full five stars is that I thought the parts that were supposed to be from her aunt's diary read more like a novel. I took me out of the story a little. Nobody writes that way in their journal, at least not in my opinion. Also there was a slight problem with my believing that the journal would still be where it was found, and still readable.

Coincidence is still a really good read and I recommend it to readers from young adult up. It's squeaky clean and even a little educational.

(View all my reviews on Goodreads)

Now for a little about the author. If any of you are in the Logan UT area today. Danette Hanson is doing a book signing at Hastings in Logan.

If like me, that's too far to go you can learn a little about her on this blog. I asked her four questions. Here are the answers. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.

1. Tell me a little about yourself. Anything fun or goofy that we should know?

I'm a mother of four, with a wonderful husband. My children get a kick out of my made up words. It's not like I'm 

trying to make up words, they just come out funky and weird sometimes. Like when my daughter had her learning permit,

I'd say, "Turn on your dinky donk," or "Reverse and go real slow." My children all wonder what kind of things I'll say 

when I turn 80.(My husband too I'm sure) Maybe I can create fun characters in my children's books like Dr. Suess did.

My crazy children stories usually have to do with bubblegum. I've always loved gum. One thing you should know about me is, I love to laugh

2. Where do you live and what it like to live there?

I live in Cache Valley, (Utah) in the small town of Wellsville. It's a lot like my home town of Alamosa, Colorado in where it snows too much, for too long and is much too cold. 

Even though I don't like the snow per say, my children can actually tube down the hill just in our back yard––which they love. So I guess that's not a bad deal. They can be out in the white, cold stuff while I stay warm inside and watch them out the window. I really live in a beautiful place, love the area and the people. It's a great area to raise a family.

3. Tell me a bit about your family/home life (if you don't mind).

Let's see what is there to tell.... if I get on the computer too early, I'll get sucked in and none of my house chores get done. True story. My husband teases that he hasn't had a home cooked meal for months. My children are older now (my baby is 14) so I can get away with writing more, which can be a good or bad thing. I make jewelry out of spoons and forks. Love all things artsy. (So pinterest can eat up my time too) That's probably why my children are so creative, they've been around crafty things their whole lives. (Grandma is real creative and artistic too and they love to spend time with Grandma) I draw, some. Have always loved art. However, I do more coveting of those who draw more than anything.

4. Why do you write? What do you write? Do you have any weird writing habits? (I know that's 3 questions, just tell me about your writing.)

Well, I didn't really want to write until later in life. In fact, in school if we had to write a book report, I just watched the movie instead. But I guess I've always had a vivid imagination and I've always named anything that looked to have a personality. It's got to have personality to get a name. I did a course with Children's Literature Institute and loved it. Now I can't stop writing. In fact, I have too many ideas and not enough time. When I ask my children to listen to what I've written, they say, "Oh, I've got things to do. Maybe later." Then I duck tape them to the chair and make them listen. NOT really. They all support me (as long as I cook them dinner. That's why Katee is in our family so she can do the cooking.) I absolutely LOVE my family! And they would be lost without me––who else is going to talk like they're from another planet without even trying? 

I love to laugh, write, read, and go to the movies. I’m a foot zoner so I like to learn about holistic living.

I believe there are magical moments in life––and if there isn’t for a time, then that’s when you wish for magic. Writing is magic. I get to discover the story just like a reader. As the magical elements fall into place in a story I've learned to recognize that’s really how life is; magical when you least expect. 

To learn more about Danette J Hansen and her books, check out the links below.

Website /  Goodreads / Twitter / Facebook 
Coincidence Amazon / Barnes&Noble / Kobo
Space Gum picture book Amazon