Reviews By Charline

“Not Just Spirited”

Author: Chynna T. Laird

When asked if I would be interested in reviewing “Not Just Spirited” I jumped at the opportunity. I feel books that are informative, relate to hardships experienced by others, and can consequently provide helpful information in an easy-to-read understandable format are extremely important to us as a society.

I began reading “Not Just Spirited” and I was truly touched by the empathy the book’s author, Chynna T. Laird, showed to her daughter Jaimie. For those who don’t know: Sensory Processing Disorder is an inability of the brain to process information received through the senses. Consequently those who suffer from SPD are unable to properly understand how to interact with their environment. Light, touch, sound, taste and smell can cause moderate to severe discomfort which is made worse if the child is too young to verbally communicate what is wrong.

As I continued reading I wish I could say I was surprised by the lack of understanding and help Jaimie and her family received from the highly trained medical community but in all honesty, I wasn’t. I also find it amazing how the general response to a problematic child is “it’s just a phase” or “he or she will grow out of it.” Personally I would find those generalizations insulting. As a parent shouldn’t you know your child’s behavior better than anyone else? Isn’t there that mysterious “bonding” between mother and child so that even a “first time” parent’s concerns should be taken seriously? Shouldn’t the medical community give some credence to a parent’s observations? After all, parents generally live with their child twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, while a pediatrician may only see that same child once every few months.

In summary I found “Not Just Spirited” to be an incredibly well written and inspirational book. Laird shares with her reader the day-to-day and sometime even minute-to-minute struggles of someone who suffers from Sensory Processing Disorder. Her personal experiences enable us to better understand this disorder and Laird has found a way to help her daughter progress with her life in a healthy manner. I feel this book will also provide useful tips, information, and resources for other parents who may face the same, or similar, challenges. I would like to thank Laird for taking the time to share her family’s story with us and I am appreciative that she has done so using language that the common person can understand.

“Perfect Alibi”

Author: Sheldon Siegel

I’ve just finished reading “Perfect Alibi” by Sheldon Siegel and now I’m attempting to write its review. Unfortunately for me, I’m having some trouble with that. No, it’s not because I’m suffering from writer’s block. I’m just at a loss for words because the only thing running through my head right now is “Wow, what a great book!” Just for the record, heaping praise on a book isn’t my customary starting point in a review.

“Perfect Alibi” by Sheldon Siegel is the seventh installment in the Mike Daley Mystery series. In this episode Mike Daley and Rosie Fernandez discover that their sixteen-year-old daughter’s boyfriend Bobby has been arrested for the alleged murder of his father who also happens to be a Superior Court judge. All the evidence seems to point to Bobby as the killer yet he is emphatic that “he didn’t do it” and their daughter Grace is his only alibi. Against their better judgment Mike and Rosie take the case. In an attempt to exonerate Bobby they wind their way through some of San Francisco’s seedier neighborhoods and in doing so they uncover a sex scandal involving some of the city’s more prominent citizens.

I found “Perfect Alibi” to be a fantastic read and it kept me on the edge of my seat. Siegel is an amazing writer and he has a way of deftly enveloping you in the story. This book is legal fiction and because of Siegel’s writing style I felt as if I was personally sitting in the courtroom watching the various proceedings. I liked that the book was written in the first person and I definitely enjoyed the sarcastic and sardonic thought processes of Mike Daley.

Overall, I would say this book is a five-star “must read.”

“The Wind in the Woods”

Author: Rose Senehi

Initially I had some difficulty getting into “The Wind in the Woods.” While the book’s author, Rose Senehi, does have solid writing skills; her particular style did not immediately reach out and draw me in. In Senehi’s defense there are several plots intertwined throughout “The Wind in the Woods.” Once the characters were introduced; once the plots merged into a cohesive story; Senehi’s novel was able to garner my interest and hold my attention.

Moving on to the book: “The Wind in the Woods” is a romantic thriller set around the Green River Valley which is located in North Carolina. The book’s main players are Tiger Morrison, a charming and charismatic widower. Tiger’s beautiful daughter, who unbeknownst to anyone, including herself, is being stalked by a serial killer, and finally the nine-year-old Alvin Magee who is happily learning lessons about freedom and responsibility.

Tiger owns a children’s camp he built in the Southern Blue Ridge Mountains. Every summer he opens this camp in order to share wonders from the pristine land surrounding it with the kids. His love for these mountains causes him to take on the real estate developers who are intent on buying a large parcel bordering his. Tiger understands that if this sale happens the developers will have no remorse whatsoever about the damage they will inflict upon the surrounding area. Somehow he has to come up with an exorbitant amount of money in order to buy the land himself until he can get a conservationist group involved.

Alvin is one of the camp’s kids and at first glance he is completely out of his element. He’s skinny; he wears glasses and his mother is too overprotective. However, he does a phenomenal job of making up for whatever he’s lacking with sheer determination and spunk. He loves the camp and because of his experiences there he learns about himself and about the man he will become.

All in all I found “The Wind in the Woods” to be a decent read. Senehi does write well and she does pay attention to detail although I did feel the story started off too slowly. I enjoyed the environmentalism throughout the book and I definitely appreciated that while part of this novel included a sociopath Senehi was kind enough to leave out the majority of gruesome details.

“The Traveler”

Author: Jenna Lindsey

Several weeks ago I was looking for some new books to read / review; hoping to find a few that would interest me. I haven’t read any science fiction or fantasy in a while and the title “The Traveler” in this genre caught my eye. Of course I did my usual due diligence in order to find out what the book was about and while I wasn’t completely captivated by the book’s cover, I did find the jacket blurb sufficiently interesting enough to want to read it. I’m glad that I did.

“The Traveler” by Jenna Lindsey has an interesting premise. Jinnie, the book’s main character, seems to be caught between two worlds. She’s here on earth and yet she feels as if she’s living elsewhere at the same time. This alternate life is amazingly vivid and Jinnie is having trouble figuring out which is real and which is the illusion. At night, as she sleeps, she dreams of a man named Griffin. A man who loves her completely; a man she longs to be with yet how can she when he is only a figment of her imagination. Or is he…

Suddenly and without warning Jinnie is pulled into a completely different world. She struggles to keep the memories of her past intact while trying to remember the life she’s currently living. At every turn it seems she faces lies, subterfuge, and deceit. When at last she regains her memory she learns a horrifying truth. She realizes her life has been unfairly twisted and she learns the awful heartbreak that goes hand in hand with the words “I love you.”

I don’t want to provide any more of this story but I will give “The Traveler” a solid four star rating. I found the book to be well written, very interesting and it held my attention completely. Lindsey has a great writing style as well as a wonderful imagination. She is descriptive without becoming boring; the interactions between the characters flow smoothly, and the transitions between the different worlds are, for the most part, seamless. The author could have made this book into a series and perhaps, in future, she will. I think it also has great potential as a movie script.

For those of you who don’t normally enjoy reading science fiction I would suggest you ignore that particular categorization. I feel Lindsey has done a great job of taking some elements from science fiction and merging them together with fantasy and romance. As such this is definitely not a hard-core sci-fi read.

“The Post Debutante”

Author: Herman Franck, Esq.

Initially I was very excited to read and review “The Post Debutante” written by attorney Herman Franck. I loved the book’s cover. It reminded me of the early twenties and I was enthusiastic to see how that “look” and “feel” would be brought into a story set in today’s day and age.

Upon receiving “The Post Debutante” the first thing I did, after admiring the cover again, was flip it over so I could read the back. I always enjoy reading the information it provides as it reminds me what the tale will be about plus I get to learn something about the author. I reread the initial “about” blurb three times because the last sentence didn’t make any sense at all. “She also learns a lesson she didn’t know she already knew, that was is lovely and wealthy on the outside is not necessarily lovely and wealthy on the inside.” No, I didn’t type that incorrectly. It’s actually a typo on the back cover of the book which threw me for a loop. I was quite surprised. If nothing else I expect lawyers to possess meticulous attention for details.

Moving on to the story, I would say the premise behind “The Post Debutante” is good. A high society woman has her perfect wedding end before it evens begins because her fiancé has fallen in love with another woman. To add insult to injury this “other” woman is found dead and Nancy, the jilted bride-to-be, is charged with her murder. As I began reading I was appreciative that Franck didn’t write “The Post Debutante” using “legalese,” a word I have picked up from an attorney friend. My happiness however was short-lived as I was blown away by the complete and total over-descriptiveness of the book. Not to mention that quite often the author would repeatedly use the same word in the same sentence. Example: “He was true to the medical profession, a true professional, and knew at an early point in his career that, like most true doctors, he would never retire.” Suggestion: find a different word to use in place of true or better yet rewrite the sentence so it flows better and is not so redundant. “He was a true professional; a shining star in the medical field and like all great doctors, he knew he would never retire.”

Unfortunately, I found the writing style within “The Post Debutante” to be long-winded and tedious causing the read to be challenging. While I recognize that attention to detail is important; I must also point out that not everything needs to be exhaustively explained. Most of us have seen a wedding invitation. We know the pieces which are placed inside. We generally know what the reply card says and how to fill it out. Personally, I don’t want to read multiple paragraphs detailing every single aspect of something like that. I also had a hard time with the structure of the writing. The characters in “The Post Debutante” are members of the upper echelon of society. Their dialogue is appropriately formal and contractions are not used. However, in the non-dialogue paragraphs contractions are used which, to me, causes the conversations to seem stilted. I can only hope this is the author’s intention as a way of highlighting formal society’s speech patterns.

Finally, even though I was unable to, if the reader can get beyond the too technical and too verbose writing style of the author then this book may be able to hold his or her interest.

“Mental Illness and Your Town”

Author: Larry Hayes

The writing of my review for “Mental Illness and Your Town” has taken me a little longer to put together than what I had originally anticipated. Truthfully I didn’t connect with the book as well as I had hoped and consequently I needed some time to completely process my thoughts before I committed them to paper.

What I did like: I definitely feel that the overall message contained within the pages of “Mental Illness and Your Town” is important. I’m neither a doctor nor a psychiatrist but I would agree that “mental illness” should encompass much more than just schizophrenia or delusional psychosis. I also agree that things like bi-polar disorder or depression should be classified as a lesser form of “mental illness.” During the past few decades it seems that depression has been regarded as “trivial.” Many of us have seen, or heard, about horrific aftermaths be they suicides or senseless killings. Neither of these can be construed as “trivial.” Finally, I applaud the author, Larry Hayes, for making the time to write this book in an attempt to educate, enlighten, and provide helpful suggestions to those who seek knowledge on this subject. “Mental Illness and Your Town” is a sincerely written book and it shows.

What I didn’t like: I had a difficult time reading this book because of how it was written. I understand this isn’t a fictional story however, I still prefer an easy to follow “flow.” The author’s experiences as well as those of his family members and others were mixed in helter-skelter with resource information, tips, suggestions, phone numbers, websites, et cetera. I think the message could have been better appreciated and / or understood if the book had been divided into two or possibly three sections. Had the author devoted the first part of “Mental Illness and Your Town” to his own personal story I feel the reader could have connected better with him. The second and / or third parts of the book could have been all of his thoughts, suggestions, and resources. I also feel that this format, or something similar, would make it easier for the reader to find the information he or she was originally seeking once the book was finished. Plus, this layout would make it easier for anyone to use this book as reference material in the future.

In summary though, “Mental Illness and Your Town” is a sincere book with an important message plus, it’s a great compilation of suggestions and resources.

“Blind Tasting”

Author: A.C. Houston

I recently reviewed “Blind Tasting” but I’ll be honest and say that due to the title I wasn’t really sure what to expect at first. Would this be a fictional book about food? Would it feature a blind critic? More importantly, would it be good? Needing to know more I read the jacket blurb. Okay… The premise sounded interesting enough even if it did seem somewhat far-fetched.

Initially the book was difficult for me to get into. Not because it was boring or poorly written. It wasn’t. It’s just that I’m not very fluent in “geek speak” and that was the first thing that jumped off the page at me in paragraph one, chapter one. I’m also not the most computer literate person and so, knowing this, I took a deep breath and prepared myself to read slower. This way I could hopefully better understand phrases like “plenoptic illumination function” or “NP-complete.” *chuckle* Don’t worry; the characters don’t talk like that all the time.

Let me move on to the “meat and potatoes” of the story. Cory Wilder is the main character and he exemplifies the meaning of the word “geek.” Three guesses who used that memorable phrase “plenoptic illumination function…” Besides being incredibly smart, he’s also attractive; he has a great job and a gorgeous girl-friend. What more could a guy, geek or otherwise, really ask for? Unfortunately Cory’s world is suddenly turned upside down. He has two choices. He can sit around and mope or he can pick himself up and start putting his life back together. One evening he comes up with a verifiably crazy idea. Can he train his beloved dog to identify and match wines? His two best friends, Dawn and Rob, throw themselves wholeheartedly into seeing if they can make this project work. I’m not going to provide any more of the story but I’d be willing to bet the title of the book probably makes more sense now…

In closing, I’m giving “Blind Tasting” a five-star rating. I don’t normally give out five’s but I feel this book deserves every one of them. It was well written. The premise was unique. The story was interesting albeit unusual and, truth be told, I couldn’t put it down. It was also apparent throughout the book that the author, A. C. Houston, is extremely knowledgeable about computer technology, biochemistry, wines and dogs. I felt “Blind Tasting” was kind of like Sherlock Holmes meets Nancy Drew meets MacGyver. I would also consider A. C. Houston to be the upcoming Clive Cussler type author for a technology loving generation.

“The Womb of Uncreated Night”

Author: Chris Antonides

Let me begin by saying I truly enjoyed reading this book. “The Womb of Uncreated Night” by Chris Antonides is a fictional story and is extremely well written. I first decided to read it because I was intrigued by the concept. A seventeen-year-old boy with extremely poor eyesight and a love of bats believes himself to be Bruce Wayne aka “Batman.” In the opening chapter we meet the “Brewster” out for a spin in his shiny new Batmobile; test driving it so that in future he can cruise the city streets at night ready to right any wrongs. Unfortunately he winds up getting into an accident and the next thing we know Batman is being incarcerated. How would you like to be the officer radioing your precinct about that arrest? I’m sorry… You’ve got WHO in custody?

Some of you may be wondering what’s so great about a story with a kid who thinks he’s a comic book super-hero. There are probably other books written with similar themes so why would you want to read this one? Well, Antonides decided to throw a little something extra into the mix. Brewster’s girlfriend is attacked in Central Park and when he finds her body it appears as if she’s been bitten by a bat. Or worse and even more unbelievable…a vampire. This book is kind of like “Batman Begins” meets Anne Rice’s vampires and let’s just throw in someone like Sigmund Freud so we can have some scintillating conversation between Brewster’s psychiatrist and our obviously crazy yet genius boy wonder. Of course at the end of each of these court required sessions both psychiatrist and reader will be wondering how deluded our hero actually is.

Antonides did a great job of explaining how things like the batcave came to be. I marveled at the ease in which the infamous batsuit came to fruition and I laughed at the image of Brewster hanging from the ceiling by his feet. Did I mention he literally fell out of his boots the first time he tried it? As an aside, I bet Lionel Richie would have loved a pair of those boots when he made his “Dancing on the Ceiling” video…

Lastly, the author seems very knowledgeable about world history and the arts. This gives a credibility to his writing style and makes the story that much more believable. All in all it was a great book. I definitely enjoyed the read and I highly recommend it.

“The End of Baseball”

Author: Peter Schilling, Jr.

A few weeks ago I was in northern California talking to a close friend of mine who happens to be an Oakland A’s fan. I remember mentioning to him that I had decided to read and review “The End of Baseball.” He gave me a blank look until I explained the book’s premise: a fictional novel about baseball starring Bill Veeck, the Philadelphia Athletics and an all black team set in the early forties. My friend sort of chuckled before asking if Eddie Gaedel was going to be in the story as well. Of course I had no idea who he was talking about and this prompted a Google search.

Learning about Gaedel caused me to do some serious research on Veeck. I have to give major props to Peter Schilling Jr., the book’s author. Who better to fill the sizeable shoes of the maverick promoter in “The End of Baseball” than Bill Veeck; the very man who was probably best known throughout the league for his flamboyant publicity stunts and the innovations he brought to baseball during his ownership of the St. Louis Browns, Cleveland Indians and Chicago White Sox. I don’t think the author could have chosen a more suitable person than Veeck to help give this novel an authentic and realistic feel.

Continuing with the storyline; Veeck returns from Guadalcanal with a missing leg and five hundred dollars to his name. He manages to purchase the Philadelphia Athletics and gets rid of all the white players. In 1944 that was the entire roster. Unbeknownst to anyone except his business partner, Sam Dailey, Veeck secretly recruits the legendary stars of the Negro Leagues and signs them to play in the majors. In an era of war and racial segregation Veeck gambles everything on the hope that people’s love of seeing great baseball will overcome the integration of a black man into the major leagues.

In summary, I must say that “The End of Baseball” was a joy to read. I definitely prolonged it for as long as possible. Over the years I have read my fair share of baseball novels but in my opinion none of them can hold a candle to this one. Schilling has a fantastic writing style. His words flow smoothly. His descriptions will make the reader feel as if he or she is actually in the dugout watching baseball greats like Satchel Paige, Buck Leonard or Josh Gibson in person rather than reading about them in a book. While “The End of Baseball” is a work of fiction the author has done such a fantastic job that, at times, his readers may have trouble separating fact from fiction.

A definite “must read” for anyone who loves a great book…

“Letters from Wheatfield”

Author: Patrick Shannon

About a week ago I was perusing some book titles when “Letters From Wheatfield” caught my eye. I paused; my fingers hovered over the keyboard as I reread the title. I have no idea what stopped me but I memorized the spelling of the author’s name and off I went to Amazon.com. Researching a title is habit for me as I prefer to know more than just the book’s name before I decide to read it…

Moving on to the book; let me explain its premise: two people uproot themselves from the bustling borough of Manhattan only to relocate to Wheatfield, Montana. Population? Two thousand… Talk about culture shock. Can you imagine having to drive more than a hundred miles to visit your doctor? It’s no wonder doctors no longer make house calls…

Anyway, “Letters From Wheatfield” is exactly what the title suggests; a compilation of correspondence from Fred Moore, our city-slicker now turned country-bumpkin, to his cousin Amelia. Did I mention that each chapter aka “letter” is hilariously funny? I really must confess that I giggled and chortled my way through the entire book. Well, that is until I reached the letter titled “Taking One’s Lumps.” Throughout the reading of this one I laughed. In fact, I laughed so hard I cried. What makes “Letters From Wheatfield” so funny is that we can all relate to something in this book. If we don’t come from a small town ourselves; we have distant relations or friends who live in one. We visit them from time to time. We know…

In summary “Letters From Wheatfield” by Patrick Shannon was a hilariously funny read. I definitely give it a five star rating. This book is very well-written and Shannon’s descriptions flow smoothly plus, I think the humor is a style anyone would enjoy. I would also recommend that once you finish the book you leave it in the guest bathroom and dog ear page one hundred and thirty-eight. Let your guest’s giggles and outright laughter ensue…