#BookReview: The Lost Portal (Mirror Realm #2) by Lenore Borja

AMAZON

ABOUT THIS BOOK:

For fans of Kendare Blake’s Goddess War series comes this second installment in a gripping YA fantasy series that follows a band of huntresses taking on a world of demons and gods.

For years, Hadley Caldwell kept humanity safe by hunting demons. But that came to an end when the Mirror Realm disappeared. Now her life is filled with bridesmaid dresses, family pressures, and—oh yeah—hosting ancient deities in her sleep. It’s not world-saving work, but if dream-hosting is all it takes to keep the gods happy, she’s willing to play along and leave her huntress days behind her. That is, until the gods demand something the Portal of Osiris.

The Portal was part of the Realm. It shouldn’t exist anymore. But the gods believe it does, and claim it holds the key to their salvation. The quest for the Portal takes Hadley and her band of huntress sisters on an enigmatic adventure to the sands of Egypt and beyond. But chasing a portal isn’t as easy as outrunning your past, and soon the only things Hadley knows for certain are that the gods can’t be trusted . . . and some portals should never be found.

Join Hadley, Alice, Olivia, and Soxie in this electrifying second book of the Mirror Realm series as they traverse the globe on an ancient scavenger hunt full of mystery, magic, intrigue, and sisterhood.

#BookReview: Anna Bright Is Hiding Something by @susieschnall @GoSparkPoint

Synopsis: What some women will do for success…

A fast-paced and ripped-from-the-headlines story set in the glossy offices of Silicon Valley startups and New York City new media, Anna Bright Is Hiding Something explores our culture’s fascination with businesswomen who are breaking barriers—and sometimes behaving badly in the process.

Anna Bright is committing fraud. But nobody knows it yet. Not the board of her multibillion-dollar company, BrightLife; not her investors; not the media; not the public breathlessly anticipating the imminent launch of BrightSpot.

Jamie Roman, a hardworking journalist for BusinessBerry, is, no surprise, in awe of her company’s billion-dollar valuation, her polished confidence, and her hustle. But when Jamie learns about Anna’s misconduct, she embarks on a bicoastal journey to expose the crimes in the hope of making a name for herself as a journalist. It’s not long before Anna learns what the young reporter is up to, however—and she’ll do anything to stop Jamie, especially now that BrightLife’s IPO is days away.

With news of the deceit about to break, each woman will risk everything for her version of the truth . . . and only one will emerge unscathed.

#BookReview: The Grandest Garden by @MaDonnaNegra

Synopsis: Bella Fontaine is on her own. Fresh out of college and with the winnings from her first international photography competition, she decides to leave Los Angeles to forge a new life in New York City. But will she be able to overcome the trauma of her childhood and her break from home to make it as a successful artist and professional photographer in a new city? Or will her secrets catch up with her ,and keep her from developing the relationships she needs to make her dreams come true?

We meet young Bella just after her tenth birthday, and her grandmothers, Olivette and Miriam, each with a beautiful, mature garden as different from each other as the two gardeners who tend them. As Bella’s homelife begins to unravel, she relies on her grandmother’s gardens as her refuge for stability and belonging. But when Miriam moves in with Olivette in search of healing, the grandmothers bond in a way that makes Bella feel excluded. What happens next sends Bella out into the world before she is ready.

The Grandest Garden is a poignant coming-of-age story about the ties that bind us to our people and how to survive when they break.

#BookReview: Ride or Die: A Husband's Memoir by @thedailymba @GoSparkPress

Synopsis: Modern society has a warped sense of the partner-caregiver role, especially for men. Too often, men are ill equipped to handle switching from provider to caregiver, and the “just suck it up” advice so many offer up falls as flat as the Kansas prairie in the face of the reality of life and death.

Ride or Die takes its audience through the intimate conversations and thoughts of a Gen-X latchkey-generation husband—a man who has always had to fend for himself and believed that it’s up to him to solve his own problems—as and after his wife, Jane, succumbs to a terminal disease.

Jarie Bolander wrote this raw, heartfelt tribute to Jane and her handling of her illness to help men and the people who love them through the experience of loss and grief. A frank chronicle of how an intimate relationship can change and grow—even when the people involved feel there is nothing left to give— Ride or Die offers a detailed exploration of the male experience of grief, in the hopes that others suffering through it will not feel so alone.

#BookReview: Ride or Die: A Husband's Memoir by @thedailymba @GoSparkPress

Synopsis: Modern society has a warped sense of the partner-caregiver role, especially for men. Too often, men are ill equipped to handle switching from provider to caregiver, and the “just suck it up” advice so many offer up falls as flat as the Kansas prairie in the face of the reality of life and death.

Ride or Die takes its audience through the intimate conversations and thoughts of a Gen-X latchkey-generation husband—a man who has always had to fend for himself and believed that it’s up to him to solve his own problems—as and after his wife, Jane, succumbs to a terminal disease.

Jarie Bolander wrote this raw, heartfelt tribute to Jane and her handling of her illness to help men and the people who love them through the experience of loss and grief. A frank chronicle of how an intimate relationship can change and grow—even when the people involved feel there is nothing left to give— Ride or Die offers a detailed exploration of the male experience of grief, in the hopes that others suffering through it will not feel so alone.

This title will be released on September 5, 2023.

#BookReview: The Belonger by Mary Kathleen Mehuron @GoSparkPress

Synopsis: Caribbean-island innkeeper Holly Walker is hunkering down against a monster hurricane. Unfortunately, so is player Lord Anthony Bascombe, a man who excuses his bad behavior by saying he is descended from pirates. Then her grown son, Byron, and his father, Montez—the man she’s never stopped wanting—go missing. Will she ever see them again? What about the many others hurt and dying? And will help ever arrive? With each passing day, Holly’s tumultuous past and the epic storm send her hurtling toward a shattering climax that will change the island—and Holly’s life—forever.

#BookReview: The Belonger by Mary Kathleen Mehuron @GoSparkPress

Synopsis: Caribbean-island innkeeper Holly Walker is hunkering down against a monster hurricane. Unfortunately, so is player Lord Anthony Bascombe, a man who excuses his bad behavior by saying he is descended from pirates. Then her grown son, Byron, and his father, Montez—the man she’s never stopped wanting—go missing. Will she ever see them again? What about the many others hurt and dying? And will help ever arrive? With each passing day, Holly’s tumultuous past and the epic storm send her hurtling toward a shattering climax that will change the island—and Holly’s life—forever.

#BookReview: The Byways by @theweirdgirl @GoSparkPress

Synopsis: High school student CeeCee Harper has special needs, a temper, and a reputation for trouble. Angry at the rumors and afraid she’ll never fit in, she makes a wrong move—and lands in the Byways, a world of alleys, magic, and forgotten people . . . some that aren’t even human. And if she doesn’t escape quickly, CeeCee learns, she’ll be trapped for good.

Searching for a way out, she gets lost among monsters, drug pushers, the homeless, and political upheaval, and soon finds there are those who will stop at nothing to keep her from leaving. But the Byways pull people in for a reason. CeeCee must figure out why she got stuck in the first place—before her loved ones are put in danger and she loses them forever.

A dark retelling of Alice in Wonderland meets Neverwhere, this contemporary fantasy will enchant Neil Gaiman and Christina Henry fans.

#BookReview: The Last Huntress (Mirror Realm #1) by @LenoreBorja

Synopsis: Alice Daniels has a problem. Her reflection keeps misbehaving when she looks in the mirror--and the longer she ignores it, the harder it tries to get her attention. On her eighteenth birthday, she learns why: she is a huntress, someone gifted with the power to enter mirrors and the magical world that exists beyond. But with this power comes immense responsibility, for in the Mirror Realm lurks an evil that has infected the human race for centuries: demons. It is up to her and her three huntress sisters--with the help of one handsome and overbearing protector--to hunt and banish this evil one demon at a time, thereby keeping the chaos in check. But when an ancient god pays Alice a visit that turns deadly, it is clear the Mirror Realm is more than it seems, and she soon finds herself in a race against time to save the life--and soul--of the one man the gods are determined to never let her have.

The Last Huntress is a story of redemption and sacrifice, the bonds of true sisterhood, and the impossible, sometimes frightening, things we'll do for love.

#BookReview: Shadows We Carry by @drmerylain

Synopsis: In this eagerly anticipated sequel to Meryl Ain’s award-winning post-Holocaust novel The Takeaway Men, we follow Bronka and JoJo Lubinski as they find themselves on the cusp of momentous change for women in the late 1960s. With the United States in the grip of political and social upheaval, the twins and a number of their peers, including a Catholic priest and the son of a Nazi, struggle with their family’s ancestry and how much influence it has on their lives. Meanwhile, both young women seek to define their roles as women, and as individuals.


Enlightening and evocative, Shadows We Carry explores the experience of navigating deeply held family secrets and bloodlines, confusing religious identities, and the scars of World War II in the wake of revolutionary societal changes.

This title will be released on April 25, 2023.

#BookReview: Shadows We Carry by @drmerylain

Synopsis: In this eagerly anticipated sequel to Meryl Ain’s award-winning post-Holocaust novel The Takeaway Men, we follow Bronka and JoJo Lubinski as they find themselves on the cusp of momentous change for women in the late 1960s. With the United States in the grip of political and social upheaval, the twins and a number of their peers, including a Catholic priest and the son of a Nazi, struggle with their family’s ancestry and how much influence it has on their lives. Meanwhile, both young women seek to define their roles as women, and as individuals.


Enlightening and evocative, Shadows We Carry explores the experience of navigating deeply held family secrets and bloodlines, confusing religious identities, and the scars of World War II in the wake of revolutionary societal changes.

This title will be released on April 25, 2023.

#BookReview: Evangeline's Heaven by Jen Braaksma

Synopsis: War is ravaging the Seven Heavens. Lucifer and his Commoner supporters, the lowest class of angels, are rebelling against God's plan to exile them to the new Earth. When Lucifer departs on a desperate war mission, he leaves his daughter, Evangeline, to defend their home in First Heaven. Fiercely loyal and trained to fight, Evangeline stands ready to do her father's bidding.

But things change when Evangeline overhears the archangel Gabriel forming a plan to destroy Lucifer--because, as he tells his son, Michael, he believes Lucifer's plan is to find the Key to the Kingdom and claim the power of God to control all the Heavens for eternity. Refusing to believe her father capable of such treachery, Evangeline sets off to alert her father.

As she battles through the Heavens, however, Evangeline is shocked to discover that what she believed she knew about her father might not be true after all. For the first time in her life, she begins to question whether or not her father's motives are pure. With the fate of the Heavens hanging in the balance, she must decide who she's going to be: her father's daughter, or her own person.

#BookReview @GoSparkPress: The Year Without a Summer by Arlene Mark

Synopsis: Explosive volcanic eruptions are cool, really, cool. They inject ash into the stratosphere and deflect the sun's rays. When eighth grader Jamie Fulton learns that snow fell in June in his hometown because of an eruption on the other side of the world, he's psyched! He could have snowboarded if he'd lived back in 1815 during the year without a summer.

Clara Montalvo, who recently arrived at Jamie's school after surviving Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, has a different take all this. She is astounded--and disturbed--by Jamie's frenzied enthusiasm for what she considers an obvious disaster. The teens' battling arguments cause science class disruption and create academic trouble: Jamie's headed for a failing grade in science, and may not even graduate from eighth grade; Clara's scholarship hopes are dashed. And school isn't the only place where Jamie and Clara are facing hardship: as they quarrel whether natural disasters can be beneficial, their home lives are also unraveling. Uncertainty about Jamie's wounded brother returning from Afghanistan and Clara's unreachable father back in Puerto Rico forces the two vulnerable teens to share their worries and sadness. As their focus shifts from natural disasters to personal calamities to man-made climate changes, the teens take surprising steps that astonish them. Ultimately, through hard work and growing empathy for each other, as well as for their classmates' distress over the climate change affecting their lives, Jamie and Clara empower themselves and the people they touch.

This title will be released on August 16, 2022.

#BookReview: Bit Flip by Mike Trigg

Synopsis: Fortysomething tech executive Sam Hughes came to Silicon Valley to "make the world a better place." He's just not sure he's doing that anymore--and when an onstage meltdown sends him into a professional tailspin, he suddenly sees the culture of the Bay Area's tech bubble in a new, far more cynical light.

Just as he's wondering if his start-up career and marriage might both be over at fortysomething, an inadvertent discovery pulls Sam back into his former company, where he begins to unravel the insidious schemes of the founder and venture investors that led to his ouster. Driven by his desire for redemption, he discovers a conspiracy of fraud, blackmail, and manipulation that leads to tragic outcomes--threatening to destroy not only the company but Sam's moral compass as well. Entangled in a web of complicity, how far will he go to achieve his dreams of entrepreneurial success and personal wealth?

Bit Flip is a corporate thriller that delivers an authentic insider's view of the corrupting influences of greed, entitlement, and vanity in technology start-ups.

This title will be released on August 16, 2022.

#BookReview: Sunday Afternoons and Other Times Remembered (A Memoir) by Ben Ewell

Synopsis: On the afternoon of Easter Sunday, 1992, Ben Ewell’s brother, sister-in-law, and niece were all murdered. While trying to make sense of this staggering tragedy, Ben can’t help but think back through his life: the hard work and the many peaceful Sunday afternoons growing up on his family farm in Ohio in a house without a bathroom or running water; his high school antics in the 1950s; his time in Haight-Ashbury while attending law school in 1960s San Francisco; and the highs and lows, both personal and professional, of life after school. Threaded throughout these reminiscences, Ben reveals the details of the investigation of his family members’ murders—and the arrest and trial of the parties involved. 


In this decades-long saga, there is marriage and divorce, love and loss, family and friendship; there are political campaigns and business ventures, some failed and some fruitful. Ultimately, this is a story of perseverance in the face of tragedy, of creating opportunities out of problems, and of appreciating the gift of life and the world around us—with some humor along the way. 

This title will be released on June 14, 2022.

#BookReview: Ski Weekend by @rektokross

Synopsis: Six teens, one dog, a ski trip gone wrong . . .

Sam is dreading senior ski weekend and having to watch after her brother and his best friend, Gavin, to make sure they don’t do anything stupid. Again. Gavin may be gorgeous, but he and Sam have never gotten along. Now they’re crammed into an SUV with three other classmates and Gavin’s dog, heading on a road trip that can’t go by fast enough.

Then their SUV crashes into a snowbank, and Sam and her friends find themselves stranded in the mountains with cell phone coverage long gone and temperatures dropping. When the group gets sick of waiting for rescue, they venture outside to find help—only to have a wilderness accident leave Sam’s brother with a smashed leg and, soon, a raging fever. While the hours turn to days, Sam’s brother gets sicker and sicker, and their food and supplies dwindle until there isn’t enough for everyone. As the winter elements begin to claim members of the group one by one, Sam vows to keep her brother alive.

No matter what.

Filled with twists, secrets, and life-changing moments, Ski Weekend is a snow-packed survival thriller featuring a diverse cast of teens that will appeal to fans of One of Us is Lying and I Am Still Alive.

#BookReview: Cold Snap: A Viking Cat Mystery by @CodiMSchneider

Synopsis: Tucked in the cold Colorado mountains lies the remote village of Gray Birch, a place where outsiders are frowned upon. In this village lives a cat named Bijou. But she’s no ordinary house cat; her ancestors were mousers on Viking longships, and their blood runs through her veins. Since her battle skills are hardly needed in this modern age, however, she spends her energies running the Fox Burrow Pet Inn with her human, Spencer, and her assistant, Skunk, a mentally negligible Pomeranian. Together, the happy trio has created a safe haven for their four-legged guests.

But when Eddy Line, a handsome baker from California, comes to the inn―along with his piglet and pit bull puppy―everything changes. Spencer falls for Eddy, Bijou is unhappy with the sudden changes to her clan, and the townspeople are anything but welcoming; in fact, threats are made against Eddy when he buys the town’s historic firehouse in order to open a bakery.

Then a shocking murder/dognapping occurs on the night of the bakery’s grand opening, and Bijou finds herself thrust into a tangled mystery. To solve it, she will have to summon her inner Viking―and fight tooth and claw for her new clan.

#BookReview: Final Table by Dan Schorr

Synopsis: A political thriller about sexual misconduct in the #MeToo era, one victim's battle to survive and overcome trauma, and the cable news machine that feeds off titillating scandal coverage and inflammatory confrontation, Final Table draws upon Dan Schorr's firsthand experience as a New York City sex crimes prosecutor and sexual misconduct investigator to tackle the worlds of political and media dysfunction.

Former White House staffer Maggie Raster is struggling to build her own consulting firm and overcome a recent sexual assault by an ex-boss. Kyler Dawson, a broke former poker champion, desperately needs to gain entry into a controversial but potentially very lucrative international poker tournament. The host nation faces widespread condemnation for the recent murder of a prominent female US journalist, and a pending presidential executive order threatens to prohibit him and others from participating.

Maggie's chaotic first attempt to promote her new business as a television political analyst brings her to Kyler's attention, and convinces him that her political smarts and connections can provide the help he needs. When he approaches her for assistance, she must decide whether to agree - in return for a portion of the potential $20 million prize. To succeed, she will have to confront numerous challenges - personal and political, foreign and domestic - including mounting pressure to publicly address the misconduct of her former boss. Kyler also has his own obstacles and upsetting past to overcome, but if they each can outmaneuver their daunting challenges, he might win the tournament - and earn them both a fortune. 

This title will be released on October 5, 2021.

#BookReview: 21 Questions by Alexandria Rizik

Synopsis: In Laguna Beach, California, sixteen-year-old Kendra Dimes is preparing for the 2010 USA Surfing Prime West. She’ll be competing this year in honor of her brother, who was a surfer too, but who died from a drug overdose. Kendra has suffered anxiety attacks ever since her brother’s death, and surfing is what’s been helping her heal.

Brock Parker is the new bad boy at school; he deals drugs to the high school clientele for his parents, who work for a Mexican drug lord. Though Brock and Kendra come from two different worlds, sparks fly when they meet at the homecoming dance—their attraction is magnetic. When they start a game of 21 Questions one night, they begin to learn more about each other—and, surprisingly, about themselves too. But some questions aren’t answered with the whole truth; after all, Brock can’t tell Kendra what his parents do for a living.

As Kendra and Brock experience all of life’s most exciting firsts, they prove that even when life throws you the perfect storm, you can make it through and come out stronger than before. 21 Questions is a coming-of-age journey packed with passion and heartbreak, risk and romance.

#BookReview: He Gets That From Me by Jacqueline Friedland

Synopsis: As a young mother with a toddler and a live-in boyfriend, Maggie Fisher’s job at a checkout counter in downtown Phoenix doesn’t afford her much financial flexibility. She dreams of going to college and becoming a teacher, options she squandered when she fled her family home as a teenager. When Maggie stumbles onto an ad offering thousands of dollars to women who are willing to gestate other people’s babies, she at first finds the concept laughable. Before long, however, she’s been seduced by all the ways the extra money could improve her life. Once she decides to go for it, it’s only a matter of months before she’s chosen as a gestational carrier by Chip and Donovan Rigsdale, a married couple from New York.

After delivering twin babies and proudly handing them off to the Rigsdales, Maggie finally gets her life on a positive trajectory: she earns her degree, lands a great job, and builds a family of her own. She can’t fathom why, ten years after the fact, the fertility clinic is calling to ask for a follow-up DNA test. 

This title will be released on September 14, 2021.