Blog Archives
Spelled in Ink
Spelled in Ink, by Lina Hansen, opens with a sharp, funny mix of magic, murder, and museum burglary. Cyn, a snarky and reluctantly gifted mage, is sneaking through Leonardo da Vinci’s old haunts when her job goes sideways. Cue spells, secret societies, and a charming thief. What starts as a supernatural heist at Château du Clos Lucé spirals into a mystery full of curses, dead bodies, and a centuries-old manuscript. It’s witty, fast, and delightfully chaotic.
Cyn’s voice hooked me from page one. From the moment she’s telepathically arguing with her boss while hiding in a bush, it’s clear she’s both capable and a total mess. She’s smart but allergic to her own magic, sarcastic to a fault, and impossible not to root for. When she mutters, “Maggots, what am I supposed to do?” over a corpse and a runaway tortoise, it’s equal parts absurd and oddly tender, a perfect snapshot of the book’s tone.
Hansen’s writing crackles with energy. Dialogue snaps, world-building slides in seamlessly, and every scene feels alive. The humor lands without derailing the tension; when explosions go off in Da Vinci’s bedroom or whispers rise from behind locked doors, the suspense feels earned. The blend of sharp wit and eerie atmosphere gives the book a rhythm that’s hard to put down.
The world itself feels fresh yet grounded. Magic here isn’t lofty; it’s messy, inconvenient, and often treated like an irritating chore. Cyn’s exasperated take on spellcasting (“Decades of toothache, more likely”) adds a human touch that makes the supernatural elements believable.
Between rival factions, magical science jargon, and Cyn’s chemistry with Dan the burglar, it can be hard to track every thread. But the chaos mostly works in its favor; it feels intentional, like watching a magician perform too fast for comfort but with total confidence. Cyn and Dan’s banter especially grounds the story; when he calls her “Cinderella in jeans,” it’s cheesy but endearing.
Spelled in Ink hits the sweet spot between mystery, fantasy, and comedy. It’s clever, brisk, and charmingly offbeat. Fans of Ben Aaronovitch or Seanan McGuire will love it. If you prefer your heroines scrappy and your magic delightfully unglamorous, this one’s a gem.
Pages: 160 | ASIN : B0FPBJHC8V
Day Drinkers
Day Drinkers is a lush, sun-baked story about Gemma, a woman caught between worlds on the fictional Caribbean island of St. Columba. The book follows her tangled life among drifters, hustlers, and dreamers who drink through the heat and chase meaning in the wreckage of paradise. Gemma’s story begins with small talk under a tarp at Boon Dock Marine and unfolds into something much larger, her struggle with identity, survival, and the ghosts of her family’s past. Author Kitty Turner paints the island with heat and texture: the smell of rum, salt, and cheap perfume, the pulse of reggae, and the quiet ache of belonging. This is a story about the people who live in the margins of paradise, where beauty and corruption coexist and survival is an act of endurance.
What I loved most about Turner’s writing is how it feels it rolls over you, thick and heavy, then suddenly clears into moments of stillness. Her sentences swing between gritty and lyrical, giving the island a heartbeat that feels alive. Gemma isn’t an easy heroine, she’s messy, flawed, and stubborn, but she’s real. I found myself rooting for her even when I wanted to shake her. The dialogue feels sharp and natural, full of humor and island slang, and the author never softens the hard edges of poverty, addiction, or moral compromise. The story’s spirituality creeps in like humidity, subtle at first, then impossible to ignore. Turner threads mysticism through realism in a way that feels both grounded and haunting.
The island itself sometimes feels more vivid than the people who inhabit it, and a few side characters blur together. But the novel’s rhythm, its mix of danger, longing, and low-simmering dread, kept me hooked. I admired how Turner doesn’t try to redeem everyone. She just lets them be, in all their contradictions. The result is a book that feels lived-in, like a slow afternoon after too much sun and too little water.
Day Drinkers reads as if Donna Tartt spent a summer in the Caribbean with Taylor Jenkins Reid’s eye for glamour and ruin, spinning a story that smells of salt, sweat, and spilled rum. I’d recommend Day Drinkers to readers who love character-driven stories with atmosphere so thick you can taste it. If you’ve ever wanted a novel that feels like a hangover and a confession rolled into one, this one’s for you.
Pages: 358 | ASIN : B0FLF6MW68
A Chance to Use My Knowledge
The Right Time is a time-slip romance where a woman escaping an abusive marriage wakes up in the 1980s, finding a second chance at freedom, love, and self-discovery amid the ache of what she’s lost. What inspired you to blend time-slip elements with a story of domestic survival and healing?
I was continuing my Time Slip series that started in The Wish: A Time Slip Novel, the first of a series of stand-alone women’s fiction stories that will take place in various times. The therapist from The Wish, Dr. Maeve Fossey, is the only recurring character, as she hears the wishes and mysteriously causes them to come true.
A couple of years ago, Taylor Jenkins-Reid’s Malibu Rising won a Reader’s Choice award for best Historical Fiction. It was set in the 80s, and this blew my mind! I grew up in the 80s. I love reading historical fiction, but I hadn’t written any. If the 80s are historical fiction, I can finally write a “historical” story set in a time I remember and provide details that feel authentic without a ton of research. I loved 80s music, movies, and TV, so this was my chance to use some of that knowledge.
How did you approach writing the 1980s setting in a way that felt nostalgic but not overly romanticized?
In 1985, I was thirteen years old, so I was old enough to remember a lot about the time. I think because I was there, I didn’t over romanticize it. There are advantages and disadvantages to every time.
Andie’s journey feels deeply personal. Was any part of her story drawn from real experiences or people you’ve known?
There are several pieces of this story that are based on real events, and writing about them was a type of therapy. The late-night fights between my mom and her boyfriend from when I was ten were real. On at least two memorable occasions, I heard them fighting, mostly his loud voice. Once, he tried to hit her and missed, punching a hole through the drywall of their bedroom wall. The second time, he broke a sturdy homemade stool in the kitchen, smashing it to pieces for emphasis as he berated her. For the next several months, until we moved, I had trouble sleeping. The cat and dog were also real. My cat would climb up to my loft bedroom to sleep, and the boyfriend’s dog would guard the base of the ladder.
My mom’s excuse about hitting a doorknob when trying to explain a black eye is something I also remember. The black eye was a turning point because she was unable to hide the abuse at work after that. Usually, he hit her where it didn’t show. Her co-workers all drove trucks and helped us move that Friday.
Also, real was being stood up by my co-workers for a Starbucks gathering in 2018 or 2019 that many said they would attend. In the story, nobody shows up. In real life, after waiting 75 minutes alone, I left and was walking home when someone else texted to ask if we were still there. I didn’t tell her I’d given up. I went back and met her for twenty minutes before heading home again. On the way, I ran into 5 others from work who’d gone out for drinks instead. I was hurt because they’d been no-shows for me and had gone out in the neighborhood anyway. They hadn’t bothered to tell me they’d changed their mind or invited me to go to Browns instead. I’ve never tried to have an after-school get-together again. If invited to a book launch, my co-workers don’t even RSVP, so I stopped including them. Like Andie, I struggle with personal connection daily.
And, who hasn’t been stuck in a Customer Service loop somewhere, trying to use authenticator apps and personal verification questions? Most of the time, all I want is to get through to a person who can help, not AI Customer service or endless menu loops that don’t answer your question or let you choose a team member to speak to. The frustration is real.
The other piece that was more fun to use was my experience working at video stores. I worked in one from April 1989 to July 1990 in high school. I worked at another through my third to fifth years of university from 1992 onward, keeping one shift a week through my substitute teaching years, only giving it up when I was hired for a full-time teaching position in September 1996.
What can readers expect in book three in your A Time Slip series?
I am toying with a few different ideas, but the one calling to me the most is related to The Right Time. One of the tertiary characters may suffer a heartbreak and find herself somewhere new. She is in her early thirties in 1985, and I think she will wish herself into the future, but I’m not sure where yet, but I hear Canada is lovely.
With two more Racing books planned, a dystopian heist clamouring for attention, and romantic suspense in progress, my next time slip story is still swirling through my thoughts without feeling concrete. Not yet.
Father Lost Child Found
On the surface, Father Lost Child Found is an espionage thriller that opens with a daring rescue on a Brisbane train platform and spirals into a global chase across Estonia, Thailand, and beyond. Beneath that, though, it’s the story of Galina Ivanof, a woman trying to untangle the mystery of her father’s death while confronting the ghosts of her past. What begins with crop circles and whispers of buried secrets soon collides with questions of family, loyalty, and truth. The novel blends spycraft with a touch of science fiction, weaving personal heartbreak into a much larger tapestry of conspiracies and otherworldly puzzles.
The writing caught me off guard in the best way. The style is brisk and punchy, yet the author lingers at just the right moments on small sensory details. A crutch abandoned on a train platform, the cold smell of snow-soaked pine, the weight of silence between mother and daughter, these flashes made the story breathe. Sometimes the prose veers into melodrama, but I didn’t mind. In fact, I found myself leaning into it. I liked the mix of high-stakes action with quiet, vulnerable scenes, especially the strained relationship between Galina and her mother. It gave the thriller bones a very human heart.
On one page I was in the thick of a spy story tangled with oil companies, government secrets, and drones. On another, I was reading what felt like a family saga about loss and reconciliation. And then there’s the sci-fi layer with crop circles and UAPs, which added a lot of intrigue and gives readers a break from the emotional threads. I appreciated that the author took risks. It’s rare to see a thriller that dares to stretch across genres and landscapes in such an ambitious way.
I’d recommend Father Lost Child Found to readers who like their thrillers to swerve off the predictable highway. If you’re open to a story that mixes spy games with family wounds, political secrets, and just enough science fiction to keep you guessing, this book will be a ride worth taking. It’s heartfelt and surprising, and that’s what made me keep turning pages.
Pages: 186 | ASIN : B0F7JTL4SJ
Quantum Genesis
From the opening pages, Quantum Genesis pulled me into a world where science, faith, and survival clash in a brilliant storm of ideas. It’s a story about Ode Tillmook, a scientist on a distant planet called Ghia, who’s torn between duty and conscience. His creation, a powerful compound meant to protect civilization, ends up threatening to destroy it instead. What begins as a tale of technology gone wrong evolves into something much larger, touching on consciousness, rebirth, and humanity’s place in the universe. It’s science fiction, but it feels philosophical, even spiritual. The pacing is cinematic, with scenes that swing from tense corporate politics to moments of haunting stillness and cosmic introspection.
Hanley’s writing isn’t just descriptive, it’s alive. Each sentence is humming with curiosity and heart. Sometimes I had to stop and breathe after certain passages because they carried a quiet power. The story takes big swings with its science, talking about quantum coherence, photosynthetic energy, and living planets. Yet, what hit me hardest wasn’t the technology but the emotion beneath it. Ode’s guilt, his love for his family, and his desperation to undo what’s been done all feel painfully relatable. I liked that Hanley doesn’t hold your hand. He lets mystery sit in the room with you. A few sections got a bit heavy with scientific jargon, and I found myself rereading paragraphs just to keep up. But even then, the sense of wonder kept me going.
By the time I reached the final chapters, I was both wrecked and strangely uplifted. The story turns from destruction to renewal, and that shift, from man breaking the world to man helping it heal, felt beautifully earned. Hanley writes with a sincerity that’s rare. You can tell he loves both science and storytelling. There’s awe here, and anger too, and a sense that we’re all responsible for what we build. I closed the book thinking about how fragile and miraculous our world really is.
I’d recommend Quantum Genesis to readers who like their sci-fi with a heartbeat. It’s perfect for fans of The Martian or Contact, people who love the blend of intellect and emotion. It’s not light reading, but it’s rewarding. If you’re the kind of person who looks up at the stars and feels both small and infinite at the same time, this book will feel like home.
Pages: 296 | ASIN : B0FVB43R8M
O’SHAUGHNESSY INVESTIGATIONS, INC. Leave Murder to the Professionals
A.G. Russo’s O’Shaughnessy Investigations, Inc. swept me into wartime Brooklyn in 1944, where the O’Shaughnessy Detective Agency tries to stay afloat as war, love, and corruption tighten their grip. The story follows Maeve O’Shaughnessy, a resilient woman running her family’s detective agency while her brothers fight overseas. She juggles heartbreak, danger, and loyalty as she faces mobsters, federal agents, and the heavy shadow of the Second World War. The book blends mystery, romance, and historical detail with an intimate look at ordinary people caught in extraordinary times. Author A.G. Russo paints the era vividly. The rationing, the fear, the faith that life might one day feel normal again.
Reading it felt like slipping into another time. Russo writes with a steady hand and a clear affection for her characters. Maeve is strong without being hardened, and I admired how she never loses her compassion even when the world around her turns brutal. The dialogue feels sharp and real; it’s the kind of talk you’d hear in a smoky Brooklyn diner. Some scenes hit hard, especially when Maeve faces choices that test her morals. The emotional weight sneaks up on you. One moment you’re caught in a clever bit of detective work, and the next you’re hit with the loneliness of a woman holding everything together while the world falls apart.
The number of side plots, mobsters, federal intrigue, family drama, sometimes pulls focus from Maeve’s heart, which is the story’s strongest pulse. Yet even when the plot meanders, the writing carries it. Russo’s world feels lived-in, and her affection for her cast gives the novel warmth that lingers. The prose isn’t flashy, and that’s part of its charm. It feels honest, unpretentious, like it’s being told over a cup of coffee on a gray Brooklyn morning.
When I finished, I sat for a while thinking about courage. The quiet kind that never makes headlines. Russo’s story isn’t just about solving crimes; it’s about surviving them, about staying decent when decency feels naïve. I’d recommend O’Shaughnessy Investigations, Inc. to readers who love classic mysteries, strong-willed heroines, and wartime stories grounded in everyday heroism. It’s a slow burn, but by the last page, it left me both moved and grateful for Maeve’s grit.
Pages: 342 | ASIN : B0FRHCZRG9
Deadly Vision
Deadly Vision starts like a high-tech thriller but unravels into something much deeper and darker. It follows Dr. Taylor Abrahms, a driven ER doctor whose research into virtual reality medicine collides with political greed, corporate secrets, and moral decay. From a Silicon Valley conspiracy to a presidential campaign in chaos, author T. D. Severin stitches together the worlds of science, power, and human frailty with an eerie sense of realism. The story opens with a murder and keeps up a relentless pace, jumping between operating rooms, campaign dinners, and backroom plots. At its heart, it asks one big question: how far would we go in the name of progress?
Severin’s writing has a cinematic quality. Scenes move like quick cuts in a film, filled with blood, urgency, and political swagger. The dialogue feels authentic, sometimes clinical, other times sharp enough to draw blood. The medical details are vivid and intense, almost uncomfortably real, and the moral tension keeps you off balance. Abrahms is compelling, but he’s also hard to love, too focused, too numb from exhaustion. And that’s the point, I think. Severin doesn’t romanticize science or heroism. He shows their cost.
What struck me most wasn’t the tech or the politics but the fear under it all. The fear of losing control, of letting machines replace human touch, of progress turning against its maker. The book hums with that dread. It’s ambitious and messy and alive. The villains feel terrifyingly real because they believe they’re doing the right thing. And Severin has a knack for making every ethical question feel personal. There’s a sadness that lingers after the last page, the kind that stays with you longer than the plot itself.
I’d recommend Deadly Vision to readers who like their thrillers with brains and bite, people who enjoy Michael Crichton’s scientific tension or Robin Cook’s medical intrigue but want something a bit grittier. It’s not a light read, and it doesn’t hand you easy answers. But if you like stories that make you squirm, think, and wonder what’s really possible when science meets ambition, this book will grip you from start to finish.
Pages: 468 | ASIN : B0DZ3JWVYX
LITERARY TITAN 