Blog Archives
The Awful Odyssey
The Awful Odyssey follows young Burgeon, a half-canid, half-raptor pup caught between two worlds. The story opens with dreamy flights through Sleeping Locus and shifts fast into the grim reality of the Loyal Trench. What starts as a simple coming-of-age tale becomes a journey through class divides, harsh routines, emotional wounds, and the mysteries of realms beyond sight. Burgeon fights expectations at school, struggles under the weight of poverty, and clings to a fading bond with his mother. The book grows darker and stranger as secrets seep through the cracks of his life, and the tone swings between wonder and dread. It feels like a fable wrapped in a nightmare, stitched together with heart.
I was swept up in the contrast between light and dark. The author writes with an emotional honesty that I really enjoyed. The dream sequences are soft, fragrant, and warm. They lulled me in with that childlike belief that everything bright will stay bright. Then the trench scenes slapped me awake, though. The grime, the cold, the cruelty, the sense that the world has teeth. The writing leans into that contrast again and again. I was frustrated with Burgeon sometimes. At other times, I felt like I understood him and really cared about him. The pacing dips occasionally, yet even in the slower parts, I felt the tension humming. The story carries a sense of constant threat and constant longing that kept me engaged in the story.
The ideas the story explores were really intriguing. Identity. Shame. Desire. Responsibility. The book pushes all of those themes into a tight space and watches them rattle around inside Burgeon’s life. I kept thinking about how much he wants structure even as he fights it. How much he wants freedom even as it scares him. The scenes with the wizard surprised me the most. They were tender. They were strange. They reshaped everything I had assumed about the world he lives in. I loved that shift. It made the story feel bigger than its darkest moments and gave me something hopeful to hang onto. The writing never tries to sound clever, and that plainness works well. It lets the emotional weight sit right on the surface where you can’t ignore it.
I’d recommend this book to readers who enjoy character-driven fantasy that leans emotional, odd, and a little grim. If you like stories about broken places and resilient kids. If you like worlds that feel worn down yet still magical. If you like tales that sit with pain but don’t give up on wonder. Then this book is perfect for you.
Pages: 200
My Dogs Were So Funny
Peaches and Jake Celebrate Christmas follows two rescue pups as they enjoy the wonder of Christmas morning with their family. Where did the idea for this story come from?
The events of this books actually took place a couple of years before I wrote the book. I always take a lot of pictures if things that happen in my life, and one year my dogs were so funny with their Christmas toys that I took a lot of pictures of them with their toys. One day after I had written my first two books, I ran across the dog’s Christmas pictures I had previously taken and thought that it would be a funny story to write about.
Are there any experiences from your own life included in Peaches and Jake’s Christmas antics?
All of the events in my books are true… they actually happened… and pretty much the way they happened.
Can readers look forward to more adventures with Peaches and Jake?
I don’t have any plans at this time to write another “Peaches and Jake” book.
Author Links: Amazon | Website
Perfect for children ages 3 to 7, Peaches & Jake Celebrate Christmas is a delightful read that will inspire young readers to embrace the joy of giving, the magic of Christmas, and the importance of family & friendship. Each page is filled with warmth and holiday charm, making it an ideal addition to any family’s Christmas reading tradition.
I Know You
I Know You follows Eilidh, a Scottish teenager whose life flips from exam day nerves to heartbreak to something far stranger. What begins as a coming-of-age story full of friendship, grief, and young love suddenly veers into a haunting experience in an Ethiopian refugee camp, where suffering, compassion, and disorientation collide. The book jumps between timelines and perspectives in a way that keeps you leaning forward, trying to stitch the pieces together just as the characters try to make sense of their own fractured realities. It feels intimate at times and then shockingly vast, almost like two novels braided into one.
The opening stretch, set in Scotland, felt light on the surface, but it carried an ache that hit me harder as the chapters moved on. The writing holds a kind of gentle honesty. It stays close to Eilidh’s emotions without dressing them up, and it lets her teenage certainty sit right beside her unravelling doubts. When the story shifts into the chaos and brutality of the camp, the tone changes sharply. I felt the ground move under me just as she does. Those sections knocked the breath out of me. They were raw, unsettling, and written with a restraint that made everything feel even more real. I kept pausing, not because I needed a break from the book, but because the moments asked for you to think about them for a moment.
There were points where the transitions left me a little lost. Even so, the emotional core held everything together for me. The scenes of care, fear, and tiny human connections had me thinking about them and the story for a while afterwards. And the way the book treats memory and trauma felt honest. Messy. Human. I appreciated that it didn’t try to explain everything. It trusted me to sit with uncertainty, and that trust made the story hit deeper.
This is the kind of novel I’d hand to readers who like character-driven stories that wander into unexpected territory, people who don’t mind when a book lifts them up just to pull the rug and make them feel something sharper. If you enjoy coming-of-age stories that refuse to stay tidy or narratives that mix tenderness with real darkness, you’ll enjoy reading this book.
Pages: 328 | ASIN : B0C545LJDG
Final Curtain
Final Curtain is a rich and eerie collection that gathers voices from across time and imagination and sets them wandering through the long shadow of The Phantom of the Opera. Each story pulls a thread from Leroux’s world and spins it into something new. Sometimes it feels dreamy. Sometimes it slips into horror so quietly that you only notice once you’ve already shivered. The book opens with Steve Berman’s thoughtful introduction, setting the stage for the authors’ explorations of obsession, beauty, grief, and the strange spell of performance, and then moves through an eclectic lineup of tales that echo the Phantom’s myth without ever repeating it.
The memoir-style opening by Nadia Bulkin really resonated with me. The voice of the Countess trembles with longing and dread, and I found that mix weirdly relatable. Her fear of mirrors and her slow unraveling got under my skin. I could feel her confusion and her sorrow settling over me as if I were living in that drafty house with her. Other stories came at the Phantom from sideways angles, and that variety kept me on my toes. One moment, the writing felt delicate and sad. The next, it felt sharp and uncomfortable. I liked that. I liked not knowing what emotional corner I’d be pushed into next.
The book’s ideas were intriguing, maybe even more than its plots. So many of the stories are really about the ache of wanting something you can’t have or the way art can consume you before you even realize you’ve handed it your soul. There were times when the writing made me slow down and sit with a feeling for a bit. Some pieces were more lyrical than others, and some wandered off into tonal experiments that didn’t always land cleanly for me, but even when I wasn’t fully connecting, I still admired the nerve of the attempt. I found myself rooting for the writers as much as for the characters.
I’d recommend Final Curtain to readers who enjoy moody stories that riff on classics without getting trapped in imitation. It’s a great pick for anyone who likes gothic atmospheres, emotional messiness, or tales that play with memory, love, and the dark edges of creativity.
Pages: 302 | ASIN : B0G4MWKX56
Keeping the Stethoscope, Hanging up the Uniform, The Curse of Combat Disability Retirement
Keeping the Stethoscope, Hanging Up the Uniform tells the story of a combat-disabled Army nurse who carries his battlefield memories into the civilian ER. The book shifts between gripping trauma-room scenes, raw reflections on disability retirement, and a steady, painful questioning of how a nation can praise its veterans yet leave so many struggling to survive. It blends medical urgency with personal grief, while also tracing the larger social and political failures that shape veterans’ lives. The chapters move from intense medical narratives to broader calls for reform, tying individual suffering to systemic problems.
This was a thought-provoking and emotionally stirring book. The writing feels like a pulse that speeds up and slows down. It mimics the chaos of an ER and the quieter, heavier weight of memory. I kept feeling this mix of admiration and frustration. The author speaks plainly, and that plainness hits hard. There’s no dressing up the trauma, no soft edges on the anger. The stories the author shares are vivid. The medical scenes come alive in a way that made me tense up, and the personal reflections feel like someone talking late at night when honesty comes more easily.
What stayed with me most wasn’t the medical detail, but the sense of abandonment threaded through the book. I could feel his disappointment. His exhaustion. His hope trying to hold on even while he keeps pointing to everything that is broken. He talks about veterans who are homeless, veterans who end their own lives, veterans who are reduced to numbers in the system, and he handles all of it with a mix of sorrow and grit. Some passages made me angry in a way that almost surprised me. Others made me pause and sit with my own discomfort.
By the time I reached the final chapters, I felt grateful for his honesty. This book is a call to pay attention, to stop pretending that “thank you for your service” solves anything. It’s a reminder that behind every veteran is a story still unfolding, sometimes painfully, sometimes quietly, sometimes with no support at all.
I would recommend this book to readers who want an unfiltered look at military and medical life, especially those who work in healthcare, public policy, or veteran support fields. It’s also a strong read for anyone who wants to understand the deeper emotional cost of service, far beyond the slogans and ceremonies.
Pages: 192 | ASIN : B0G1L9FM6F
Unorganised Crime
Unorganised Crime is a gritty and fast-moving crime-comedy novel set on the Gold Coast, following two down-on-their-luck publicans, Jack Perkins and Hung Van Thanh, who stumble deeper and deeper into the orbit of loan sharks, bent cops, and assorted misfits. The book opens with Jack and Hung preparing to torch their own pub, The Hackston, a desperate attempt to free themselves from the grip of Magdalena Black, a razor-tongued loan shark whose presence dominates much of the story. From there, the novel jumps back and forth, slowly revealing how a pair of ordinary blokes managed to get themselves neck-deep in a mess involving arson, debt, and a colourful parade of criminals. It’s a crime caper at heart, but one wrapped in a very Australian blend of chaos, humour, and menace.
The writing swings between sharp, funny dialogue and gritty tension, and I found myself leaning in any time Jack and Hung tried to reason their way through a terrible decision. Author Jamie Richter captures the Gold Coast’s strange cocktail of sun, seediness, and swagger in a way that feels honest without being bleak. Some scenes hit with a punch, others with a wink, and the tone shifts feel intentional rather than jolting. I appreciated how the humour sits right beside the danger, sometimes bleeding into it, which feels true to the crime-comedy genre this book lives in.
What stood out to me most was how the characters are drawn. Jack’s cynicism, Hung’s anxious logic, Magdalena’s operatic rage, Mark Campbell’s blunt force loyalty, everyone feels heightened yet recognisable, like people you could overhear at a pub and immediately think, Of course that guy exists. The book doesn’t shy away from absurdity, but it also doesn’t let its characters become cartoons. Choices have weight. Violence has consequences. Even at its funniest, there’s a hum under the surface reminding you that these people are in real trouble. I liked that balance. It gave the story more texture than I expected going in.
I felt like I’d been pulled through a whirlwind of bad luck, worse decisions, and strangely heartfelt moments. I’d recommend Unorganised Crime to anyone who enjoys crime fiction with personality, especially readers who like their crime stories messy, funny, and grounded in character rather than procedure. If Australian crime-comedy is your genre, or if you just want a story that doesn’t take itself too seriously yet never phones it in, this one will hit the spot.
Pages: 376 | ASIN : B0G45N2762
Misconceptions of an Introvert
Misconceptions of an Introvert follows Sherry, a quiet sixth-grader who loves her own space, only to find herself misunderstood by classmates and even her teacher. After a rough experience with a superlative assignment that leaves her hurt and confused, she gathers courage and explains what it really means to be an introvert. By the end, she teaches her whole class something important about personality, kindness, and listening.
Reading this children’s book hit me in a soft spot. I kept thinking wow, I have felt that exact sting before. The writing is simple and warm, which makes the hard moments land even harder. I could almost feel Sherry’s chest tighten every time she worried about group work. The scenes with the superlatives made my stomach drop. Kids can be so blunt, and the book does not hide from that. It shows how quick people can be to judge someone. I liked that the author took her time letting Sherry figure out what to do instead of giving her an instant fix. It made the whole thing feel real.
I also enjoyed the focus on self-advocacy. It felt good watching Sherry speak up for herself, even though she was scared out of her mind. The book has this gentle way of saying hey, quiet kids are thinking deeply, and yeah, they deserve space without being labeled as strange or rude. I found myself rooting for her, and cheering when her class actually listened. The explanation of introverts was kid-friendly, and it felt smart without trying to sound fancy.
The art style in the book feels clean and clear in that classic Pixar kind of way, with a mix of lifelike moments and more playful animated ones that blend together. Some scenes look almost real, while others lean into softer shapes and bright colors that feel light and fun. No matter the style shift, every character’s face carries a ton of emotion, which makes the story hit even harder.
I think Misconceptions of an Introvert is the perfect picture book for kids who feel misunderstood, teachers who want to support all personality types, and parents who want to help their children open up or feel seen. It is kind, heartfelt, and full of truth. I would happily recommend it to any classroom or home where a quieter kid might be waiting for someone to understand them.
Pages: 35 | ASIN : B0CFZC6VW8
LITERARY TITAN 