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Author Archives: karenjvjohnson
Extinction Horizon
Extinction Horizon
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
I received an ARC from the author in exchange for an honest review.
First thing I have to say is that these are not zombies! They are infected individuals, there is a difference. I know it does not seem important but I am serious about my zombies. Secondly my true rating is 4.5 stars, and that is only because it started a bit slowly for me.
I have here an author who can write a great apocalypse and make me enjoy it as the world falls apart. The characters are realistically portrayed and feel like they could be someone you might meet in your everyday life or at least know someone who knew them. The science is easy to understand, which is good since it could get technical and bog the story down if not handled right. The disease vectors are well thought out, both for the natural and unnatural ones depicted. The descriptions of the infected did put me in the mind somewhat of those in the Will Smith movie ‘I Am Legend’ but I think it is more because they are fast and animal like. Once again, not a bad thing because I like them, as long as you don’t call them zombies.
There have been more breakouts of the Ebola virus around the globe and it appears to be mutating making it harder to treat. Doctors from the CDC are being sent out and coming back with samples hoping to isolate the strain and be able to create a cure. During the Vietnam war there had been experiments with various drugs in an attempt to create better soldiers, those attempts were disastrous.
Now Delta Force operatives are being sent in to rescue or bring back the work of a scientist who has been experimenting with some dangerous virus’s and has gotten into trouble. Master Sargent Reed Beckham and his team go in without a full understanding of the consequences and come away without the prize. Dr. Kate Lovato and her mentor are asked to help figure out what was done and find a cure, but once again they are not given all the facts. Can the world be saved when men decide to play god?
I could give a blow-by-blow but then there would be no need to read the book, and you really should read it. I kind of fell a little in love with Reed Beckham because he seemed so needy in a way, even though he is a strong man who can take care of himself and others. This seems to escalate pretty quickly and I like that we are taken through it day by day which gives a better measure of how swiftly things get out of control.
I cried a little, laughed a little, yelled at the stupid and the slow, was truly disturbed by some of the things done by the infected, and generally had a blast. This is the start, I hope, of a new world of survivors. Enjoy this immediately!
Available for pre-order. Release date December 29, 2014.
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To Have and To Code
To Have and To Code (A Modern Witch 0.5)
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This was the second book in this series that I read. After reading the first it was kind of hard not to want to go on with series. I love the characters, who make me feel like I am a part of their life from the moment we meet. The world they live in is not perfect but has enough reality added that you feel like you know it or have at least been there before.
The Sullivan’s are a big and boisterous family who just happen to be witches. But even more than that they are a family of coders and mathematical whizzes who have been running games over the net for years. Enchanters Realm is a popular game among humans and witches, but has a special level that only witches are usually able to reach because it requires the use of magic. Enter the Hacker, a guy who codes better than a lot of people, including some of those Sullivan’s. Nell and Jaime are not happy when they realize that they have been hacked but figure that they person is a witch that they simply have not met.
Daniel is a first class coder and does it for a living most of the time. He does like to peek in the backdoor of games once in a while but nothing that would be considered cheating. He finds himself plying against the wizard, but notices that some of the code seems redundant or useless, not understanding that it is magic. He manages to hold off an attack of real magic with nothing but his code, pretty good. Then he decides he wants to work for them, that could be the craziest idea he ever had.
The writing and the story are light, fun, with a sense of romance. Anyone would enjoy this story and series.
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Glass Frost
Glass Frost (First Frost #2)
by Liz DeJesus
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I have always liked a story that has a fun yet dark quality to it. This series is definitely one of those stories and has created an alternate world that our fairy tale characters inhabit but can interact with our world in significant ways. The telling of fairy tales within their new contexts is flawless giving life to them as well as the enchanted realm they come from. The story flows perfectly from incident to incident and makes sense even with the fact that these are considered to be make believe characters who only lived within the imagination of their creators.
Bianca has been home from the Everafter for only two weeks after having rescued her mother from a witch and finding her father, who had been missing for ten years, and is still missing the guy she met there. While in her backyard one night she sees a door appear and through it walks Terrance, the man she thought she would never see again. He has come because he wanted to see her again but also because the Queen has requested she return to the Everafter to do a favor for her. And no one refuses a Queen.
So Bianca goes back to the Everafter where she is seen as a powerful witch to do something her mother would not be happy about. While she is fighting for her life and that of her friends Bianca comes to an important decision that will make some happy and at the same time cause pain to others.
I recommend the two books currently in this series and hope more are to come as they have grabbed my imagination. YA is not a genre that I always enjoy but this is one of those exceptions I am always hoping to find.
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Vampire Awakenings
This is a wonderful series which I had the great fortune to literally stumble upon. Once I read book one I could not wait for book two, and now finally the long awaited book three will be coming out soon. Don’t miss it!
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Survivor Chronicles
Get it now only $.99!!
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Monument 14
Monument 14 (Monument 14 #1)
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I do love finding an author I have never read before who is able to get my attention with the first thing I read from them. The characters are a bit of a stereo type, such as jock, nerd, pretty girl, promiscuous girl, etc. but that can be overlooked for the most part. They are kids however and so you almost expect this but hope it will not be so pronounced. The dialogue is generally good, the only time it becomes a little stilted is with the introduction of adults into the main story. It also became predictable because I knew exactly where things were going as soon as in a natural progression.
It’s a normal morning in Monument, Colorado and the kids are on their way to school as the buses arrive at their homes for pick-up. But what happens after they are on the way is anything but normal. A massive hail storm starts and the hail starts to punch through the roof of the bus either killing or disorienting those on the high school bus. The driver for the elementary and middle school kids manages to get them to safety and rescue the high school kids too.
Soon the kids are left on their own with no adult supervision as the world outside the superstore they lucked into goes from bad to worse. They find themselves struggling to keep order for the younger children, who are as young as 5 years old, while trying to deal with each other and their different ways of viewing each other. They have everything they could hope for and enough to take care of them for a long time if they can keep the contaminants out. They are already living a precarious life when they allow two more into their haven, making a tense situation even worse.
This was even better than I had expected. It had a sense of tension and urgency with that feel of ‘how will they get out’. I liked enough of them to make it worth keeping up with and those I disliked was because the writing was good and gave me cause to do so. Definitely worth the time.
If you do not like the idea of children in peril and on their own I would pass it up.
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Wide Awake
Wide Awake (Academy of the Fallen #1)
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I flew through this book within the span of several hours and was surprised at how much I liked it. I like YA but it is not my usual read and so finding something that pulled me in so completely is a testament to how good it is. The characters are so well-defined that I couldn’t help but be drawn to them, even the side characters had a definite feel that gave you insight into them and what could be expected from them. Based on the ages of the characters the dialogue was spot on for they talk to each other and the adults they interact with giving them even more life.
Kayla is your typical 16-year-old, she has good friends, nice parents, and a so-so boyfriend. The one thing that seems to set Kayla apart is that she was adopted when she was 3 years old and no one has told her about her biological parents. Her days have been spent with shopping and hanging out with her friends until they go on a field trip to the museum and everything changes for her. First she sees a little girl named Carolyn in a back room at the museum and then she shows up again at her home, not totally strange and she takes her home, but then she starts seeing her in other places.
Hunter Chambers was once a friend but now is anti-social and keeps to himself. When Hunter approaches Kayla and says that he knows how to help her and she refuses. He tries a few times and then leaves the ball in her court so she can decide. As things get worse she has to call for help as her normal world starts to spin out of control. Things she never thought existed are now after her and Hunter is the only person standing between her and something worse than death.
Kayla is a kid and as teenagers go not so bad, though we would have issues with her attitude. I found Hunter to be the best part of this since Kayla is still a little to soft for my tastes, hoping for her to get a little tougher as things progress. But overall a very enjoyable and entertaining story leading to an even better story I see on the horizon. I will definitely be continuing this series!
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One Blood
One Blood
by Qwantu Amaru
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
This was a book that had me confused as to what it was really about. I went in expecting a simple horror novel but got a lot more than that. This is a twisted story of revenge, hate, blind ambition, manipulation,murder, voodoo,and a cursed family. The characters are all very dark and not always likeable but they can be sympathetic from time to time. I really found myself not liking most of them for most of the book because they were so single-minded and seemed like the worst type of opportunists. The two characters that I did feel a little something for were not really fleshed out enough for me to really decide anything about how I wanted things to go for them.
Can I just say that there is only one thing that can drive me up a wall while reading is when I have to keep track of what year I am in from chapter to chapter or even section to section within a chapter. This started in 1963 and moved in a nice linear line for a few chapters then it was on and we jumped around for almost the entirety of the rest of the story. I understand the need for it here but it made things drag a bit for me. If possible I thought there was too much background that could have been condensed and left more for those characters I wanted to get to know better. Just a thought.
This is the story of Randy LaFitte a man who was marginalized by his father when he was young and took steps to make his life better, or so he thought. Randy decided that the only way to get rid of a man he hated was to resurrect a curse which had been dormant for years. His actions set off a chain of events which will affect not only his family but the lives and families of all those within reach of his influence. Randy had big ambition and went about getting what he wanted in the most ruthless manner possible, not a nice man by any stretch of the imagination.
When his sins come back to claim him they take a form no one would believe possible.
This is a good story that I wanted to be even better. I liked where it was going but just wanted it to get there faster. I stopped and started reading when it seemed I knew what was happening but this still left not sure if I even understood it all. Don’t read this for horror but more for the mystery that surrounds everything and everyone.
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A Touch of Midnight
A Touch of Midnight (Midnight Breed 0.5)
by Lara Adrian
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is the first book I have read in the Midnight Breed series and I am glad this was my introduction. The characters are very well-defined and make you want to know more about them. While I was not pulled into the story from the first moment it did not take long for me to get really involved in the story. The story flowed so well that it was easy to determine what was happening and why things were happening the way they were.
Savannah Dupree is a student at Boston University in 1974 on a full scholarship. She is originally from Louisiana and is a very intelligent girl but has an ability which has always made her feel different from those around her, since nobody knows her here she feels more a part of things. Savannah has the ability to see the history of any object she touches. Gideon is one of the Breed, an elite vampire order which keeps the law by taking out rogue vampires. He has been a warrior for 300 years and in that time has never considered taking a mate.
Savannah is working on a special project in her art history class, helping to identify and catalog items in a collection the school has recently obtained. She finds a sword and after touching it she sees twin boys slaughtered by men who seem wrong in some way. Not long after she finds the sword it is stolen and her friend is killed in a brutal manner by a man who seems to have a lot in common with those she saw kill the twins. While giving an interview on television she is seen by Gideon who seems to know the sword she is talking about and wants to find and question her about it. But when he meets her he finds that the sword may be the least of worries.
There are the usual difficulties for the couple to go through such as misunderstandings about who knew what when and so on. But the story is kind of sweet, in a dark way. I wanted it to go on just a bit longer so I could find out just one more thing about them. I look forward to seeing them again in other novels though. I would say everyone should give it a chance.
“All it took was a chance meeting with a stranger, some unexpected conversation. A few moments of kindness from someone who had no inkling of what she’d been through. Someone who wandered into her workplace on a whim and ended up making the worst day of her life seem less awful simply by being in it. “Nice to meet you, Gideon.” “Likewise, Savannah.”
― Lara Adrian, A Touch of Midnight
― Lara Adrian, A Touch of Midnight
Bookgirl 