Category: Book Review

Book Review: Homegrown Herb Garden

Erin Penn

Amazon Cover - Herb Garden

Book Cover from Amazon

As you know, some of my arts include gardening and cooking. I really enjoyed this book.

Homegrown Herb Garden: A Guide to Growing and Culinary Uses by Lisa Morgan and Ann McCormick

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Take your home cooking to the next level by incorporating fresh homegrown herbs! You don’t need lots of space for a huge herb garden, and you don’t need to spend a lot of money on fresh herbs at the grocery store or farmers’ market. With Homegrown Herb Garden, you can choose the herb or herbs you will use the most and build your herb garden around them. Start with an overview of how to grow, harvest, and store herbs. Then, learn how to handle each herb and what flavors they work well with. The culinary section includes how to prepare and use your herbs, plus savory and sweet recipes to feature them in. Choose your favorite herbs, learn to grow them successfully, and never be at a loss for what to do with them!

 

MY REVIEW

Book comes in two parts 25% herbs and 75% recipes for those herbs. Total herbs covered 15; total recipes provided 62.

This is exactly what I’ve been looking for in an herb book! Each of the fifteen herbs are given height/width growth, water needs, and harvest instructions. The instructions for growing in containers are real instructions instead of the normal “appropriate size container and water regularly” – root depth is covered for instance. Whether the herb is a candidate for early start in house and transfer out to the garden or if it is best just to directly plant it in the garden (tranplantability). Etc.

Ms. McCormick lets the reader know when best to harvest and why (in case you ever wondered why you need to harvest early in the morning). Everything you need to set up an herb garden is here. It is amazing. Why more gardening books don’t do I don’t know. This changed how I was going to set up my garden – now I am going to split it into the “wet” and “dry” sections. Five stars all the way.

I don’t have herbs yet (still setting up the garden), so haven’t tried out the recipe section. The recipes are complicated, created by Le Cordon Bleu trained Chef Morgan – beautiful, but complicated. I may eventually attempt one or two (the rosemary chocolate chip cookie recipe is very tempting). At the beginning of each herb recipe section (at least three recipes for each of the fifteen herbs), includes best pairings with the herbs – what types of cheeses, meats, fruits & vegetables. I don’t see myself using that information very much, but new cooks working toward mastery of the kitchen may find it useful. More helpful is how to chop/use each herb in a dish – but I got most of that from the herb section. I found Chef Morgan’s sectioning herbs into woody and grassing completely unhelpful for my purposes – but I totally can see another cook getting an “a-ha” moment and running with it.

So for the recipe section, I would give two stars (Goodreads – it was okay) or three stars (Amazon – it was okay). But the herb section was so exactly what I have been looking for – and I have gone through a lot of online searches and gardening book reading, I know how rare this is and would have bought the book JUST for the herb section (in fact I did buy it just for the herb section) – I had to give this manuscript Five Stars.

Book Review: Shattering the Ley

Erin Penn

Amazon Cover - Shattering the Ley

Book Cover from Amazon

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Shattering the Ley by Joshua Palmatier

First book in Joshua Palmatier’s new epic fantasy trilogy, set in a sprawling city of light and magic fueled by a ley line network.

Erenthrall—sprawling city of light and magic, whose streets are packed with traders from a dozen lands and whose buildings and towers are grown and shaped in the space of a day.

At the heart of the city is the Nexus, the hub of a magical ley line system that powers Erenthrall. This ley line also links the city and the Baronial plains to rest of the continent and the world beyond. The Prime Wielders control the Nexus with secrecy and lies, but it is the Baron who controls the Wielders. The Baron also controls the rest of the Baronies through a web of brutal intimidation enforced by his bloodthirsty guardsmen and unnatural assassins.

When the rebel Kormanley seek to destroy the ley system and the Baron’s chokehold, two people find themselves caught in the chaos that sweeps through Erenthrall and threatens the entire world: Kara Tremain, a young Wielder coming into her power, who discovers the forbidden truth behind the magic that powers the ley lines; and Alan Garrett, a recruit in the Baron’s guard, who learns that the city holds more mysteries and more danger than he could possibly have imagined . . . and who holds a secret within himself that could mean Erenthrall’s destruction — or its salvation.

 

MY REVIEW

A solid fantasy story, sort of in the “epic” variety in that it has multiple points-of-views (POVs),  following a political situation. But also has strong romantic elements, several coming-of-age storylines, start-for-a-series worldbuilding, and some kicking sword and fist fights.

Not of the standard “epic” in that there are no orcs and elves, and the magic – while wieldable by individuals – is treated by this society more like electricity and the “mages” come to your house to fix the stove while the stronger mages fix the power lines – or in this case the ley lines. In some ways this ends up feeling more science-fiction in a historic setting than a fantasy (similar to a steampunk vibe). I guess that is why I enjoyed it so much.

We first meet the POV major characters in their childhood – Justin is 8, Kara is 12, and Allen is 16. The book has many chapters divided among five parts – these five parts read like mini-books and have two major skips through time – one of four years and one of twelve years – so at the end of the book Justin is 24, Kara is 28, and Allen is 32. One or two timing issues made me go “er”, but did not impact the story at all. For example not exactly certain what Cory’s age is at the beginning of the book. Not that it matters since he isn’t a primary POV character, although he does have a couple short POV moments.

Overall a good way to spend a few days.

Addition: With the second book out (Threading the Needle), I think it is okay to mention this is the first book of an apocalyptic story within a fantasy setting. Ecological magic-based disaster. And by apocalypse, I don’t mean the more common post-apocalypse where you see the survivors ten or twenty years or even hundreds of years after the disaster. No, this book is about the apocalypse – the destruction of civilization. Characters die – POV characters, both minor and major, die. Ones you like. Ones you don’t like. Ones you have bonded with over the course of the book. You feel the loss. Great writing.

Future books of the series hopefully will not be as emotionally draining as the last two parts of this book.

Book Review: Cellar

Erin Penn

Amazon Cover - Cellar

Book Cover from Amazon

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Cellar by Karen E. Taylor

Something’s not quite right about the neighborhood of Woodland Heights. Five years ago six children disappeared in this suburban heaven. When Laura Wagner moves into a house that had been vacant for most of those five years, this something comes alive.

Laura Wagner, divorced mother of two, addicted to alcohol and Valium, sees nothing wrong with her life; she sees nothing much at all. She gets by as well as she can, aided by the solace of her drugs and whiskey, until the day she backs into a police car in the parking lot of her favorite bar and is sentenced to involuntary rehabilitation treatments.

Returning home clean and sober is an eye-opening experience. The spirit dwelling in her house reveals its true, evil nature and begins to prey upon her, her friends, even her children, avid to spread its message of death and despair.

Laura must learn to control her inner demons before she can subdue these outside forces threatening to break free. She must learn how to distinguish hallucinations from reality, learn how to stop the spirit that requires her death and the deaths of her loved ones.

Author’s Note:
CELLAR is a re-issue of my previous published book (Twelve Steps from Darkness, Copyright © 2007 Karen E. Taylor.) The story, while essentially the same, has been edited and expanded upon in certain areas, resulting in several new scenes and an epilogue.

 

MY REVIEW

I finished reading Cellar by Karen Taylor at midnight last night – not exactly the best time to be reading this horror-ghost-recovering-addict story in a house with a damp, dark basement and parts of the house which knock at random moments. Yeah, bad idea.

First off, this is not my normal fare. I avoid horror and mental-health/addict stories, but it was in the Modern Magic pack where I knew a number of Urban Fantasy authors so I read it. It took a long time to get to the “modern magic” part. But in the meantime a solid character study was created for Laura, the Main Character – an alcoholic whose downward spiral included backing into a police car when leaving a bar. After coming home to the empty house following the sentencing, voices whisper in her head about how worthless she is – children taken by husband, loss of job, and soon to spend a month in rehab where they would take the one thing she loved from her – the alcohol. “She would be better off dead.” Again and again the whispers tell her, or is it her own mind spiraling down.

And that remains the question with each situation – it is real or her addiction altering her world? Is the depression external forces or an natural internal reaction to her situation? And the real kicker – should she even care? Every step forward she attempts is matched by a failure twice as great. But three people do not give up on her – her two daughters and one police officer who has already taken the journey back from the bottle.

Will it be enough to recover from her descent into the cellar of life with the alcohol and to fight whatever has decided to reside in her basement?

Not for the faint of heart. I’m not sure which is scarier: the “horror” story or the alcoholism whispering its siren song to her.

Book Review: The Human Division

Erin Penn

Book Cover from Amazon

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Following the events of The Last Colony, John Scalzi tells the story of the fight to maintain the unity of the human race.

The people of Earth now know that the human Colonial Union has kept them ignorant of the dangerous universe around them. For generations the CU had defended humanity against hostile aliens, deliberately keeping Earth an ignorant backwater and a source of military recruits. Now the CU’s secrets are known to all. Other alien races have come on the scene and formed a new alliance―an alliance against the Colonial Union. And they’ve invited the people of Earth to join them. For a shaken and betrayed Earth, the choice isn’t obvious or easy.

Against such possibilities, managing the survival of the Colonial Union won’t be easy, either. It will take diplomatic finesse, political cunning…and a brilliant “B Team,” centered on the resourceful Lieutenant Harry Wilson, that can be deployed to deal with the unpredictable and unexpected things the universe throws at you when you’re struggling to preserve the unity of the human race.

Being published online from January to April 2013 as a three-month digital serial, The Human Division will appear as a full-length novel of the Old Man’s War universe, plus―for the first time in print―the first tale of Lieutenant Harry Wilson, and a coda that wasn’t part of the digital serialization.

Old Man’s War Series
#1 Old Man’s War
#2 The Ghost Brigades
#3 The Last Colony
#4 Zoe’s Tale
#5 The Human Division
#6 The End of All Things
Short fiction: “After the Coup”

 

 

MY REVIEW

Mr. Scalzi attempted a new format of releasing 13 episodes as mini-ebooks; similar to the old method of serializing a story in newspapers or magazines (everything that is old is new again). A format option popular with self-published authors. After the episodes were all released, his publisher put together the whole thing in book format, adding two extras.

I did not read this during the episodic releases, and discovered the hard-copy book did not work very well as a straight read-thru. The characters’ lives had ebbs and swells that needed a break every three or four episodes. After getting about half-way through the book, I needed to set it aside for a week. Since my work was asking for 60 to 80-hour weeks during the time I was reading this book, it actually functioned well. Every Saturday I would set aside time to read three more episodes.

The writing is typical, brilliant Scalizi – a combination of humor and observations that are just too much fun. He continues to create a new character voice for each book. I love that his characters are unique – Zoe’s Tale had a teenage girl voice; The Human Division had a combination – each episode had a different POV (point of view) of diplomatic approaches. As such the diplomatic-POV did not have the pure snark factor of his first book of the universe (Old Man’s War). 

I should note the uniqueness of the universe is beginning to wane simply because of familiarity of the World – now in book five – but the universe hasn’t reached comfortable glove status. So, in places, this book felt … awkward… like a teenager – no longer a cute, shiny baby to ooh&aah over, but not fully mature like a George R. Dickson Dorsai! universe story.

This story is essential to the ongoing Old Man’s War Universe. It clearly sets up the conspiracy for the next story.

Worth the read, just do it in chunks for maximum enjoyment – the way it was originally published on the Internet.

Book Review: Athena’s Daughters

Erin Penn

Book Cover for Athena's Daughters Anthology

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Athena’s Daughters is an anthology published by the small press, Silence in the Library (presently closed, but may restart in a few years – life happens with small presses).

Athena’s Daughters is a collection of short fiction by women about women from some of the best writers in science fiction and fantasy today.

 

MY REVIEW

Athena’s Daughters is a powerful anthology written by women, edited by women, illustrated by women, about women. And a very good read in the Fantasy and Sci-Fi genre. Stories range from steampunk (Looking Back by Danielle Ackley-McPhail)) to superhero (Commando Bats by Sherwood Smith), Gothic ghost (The World to Come by Cleolinda Jones) to time travel (First Flight by Mary Robinette Kowal), modern urban fantasy (Retribution by Gail Z Martin) to military sci-fi (Not Broken, Just Bent by Tera Fullbright).

I don’t think I have seen a book with such a wide range of ages for the main characters before. Some of the females are in their twenties, some forties, and some sixties (and then there are the vampires). Nice to see older women make an impact on the world. In addition to being stories about women and having a wide range of ages, the stories also have other character traits of “diversity” (see below for some details).

Stories that grabbed me:
Commando Bats – Hera, in her contrary wisdom, has stolen the powers of male gods who were being stupid and granted them to little old ladies around the world to show them how people can use the power for good. Being the goddess of the hearth and women, of course she chose to grant the powers to females. The main point-of-view character is also disabled. I would love to see more superhero-themed stories about these characters.

Millie (by Janine K. Spendlove) – Another wonderful US Marine military short story from Ms. Spendlove (I have seen her in other anthologies) with a time travel twist you see coming if you know your aviation history but still enjoy the entire time. I really like how the main point-of-view character is Hispanic without pushing it on the audience – the character just happens to be Hispanic like most characters in American writing historically just happen to be white.

Are all the stories great? No, as with most anthologies unevenness in skill exists.

Overall a great read. And being an anthology, easy to set down and pick up again while doing chores. And with 22 stories (400+ printed pages if you buy the softback) a really good buy.