Castle Cape by C.L. Withers

★★★☆☆

Animal Violence: Yes

Well, I really enjoyed the first half of the book. The protagonist was real and likeable and the story was shaping up. However, I hit 49% and it started dragging for me.

The author is very descriptive. Some readers enjoy that. I do not. Since my reading sessions were starting to drag, I began skimming past paragraphs and soon found myself having to backtrack to pick up on information I had missed.

Unlike others, I did find the grammatical errors a bit distracting. A few here and there are to be expected, but this book suffers from a decided lack of commas that made ideas run together, as well as some very misplaced apostrophes.

The author does have a decent style, and I'd be willing to read more of his work.

Bloodstain by John C. Dalglish

★★☆☆☆

I must preface this review by saying that I did not read the first book in the series and perhaps some of the issues I experienced would have been alleviated had I been introduced to the protagonists before. I really wanted to like this book more than I did. The author's writing style is not bad, but the book is in need of an editor. A few grammar errors don't bother me, but this had more than a few, including confusing 'your'/'you're' and there/they're/their, which is distracting when you're reading.

I also found it very predictable and lacking in any real relatable characters. The usual banter one expects between police officers and detectives is missing and the attempts to make the main character seem sympathetic toward every victim and witness he deals with fell flat for me. Even the victims' experiences when described failed to spark any real emotion in me.

As for the antagonist's motivation, we meet him right away and see the motivating incident, but not enough time is spent on it to make it believable.

Finally, I found the character names distracting. They were kind of unimaginative and almost always made me stop and think 'really?' or 'I wonder what was the author looking at when he came up with that one?' It's the first time that I ever experienced that about names while reading a book.

It is, however, a quick read that is written well enough that you won't be tempted to abandon it.

A Perfect Canvas by Kevin Adkisson

★★★☆☆

Animal lovers' warning (because I am one): there is a very small amount of animal violence in the book

I must confess that I'm unsure how to review this book. The premise was pretty good, and the writing style moved me along, although there are several grammatical errors and some odd word choices (sharks of pain comes to mind). The e-book formatting needs work, for example many paragraphs are mysteriously indented.

However, the biggest problem with this book is that we're introduced to the main characters through the eyes of the villain. First impressions are hard to ignore, so rather than see Paige and Eddie as they really are, we are stuck with the villain's twisted perceptions. I would like to have met them first as they really were, and then seen how the villain viewed them.

Generally speaking, the author's overall style is pretty good and I would consider reading more of his work.

Possible Spoilers

I did find some of the characters/scenes in the book to be more filler than to have a real purpose. For example, after he is attacked, Paige's husband seeks help from a detective. A little time is spent on the detective's background and finding out what steps he can take, but he never factors into the story at all. While it was refreshing that a character in a book actually went for help (too often, the writers try unsuccessfully to present a scenario in which the victim doesn't feel that they can go for help - something I usually find unbelievable and frustrating), it would have been sufficient to know that he'd contacted the detective, not to delve into what the man might be able to do when it had no effect on the outcome.

Chris is also very confusing. I had a hard time figuring out her motivation, even after reading the prologue, but it felt more like the author either changed his mind or included her to put the reader off-balance, but her changing attitude seemed a bit forced and unnatural.

All in all, though, this is a decent, quick read.

Harm's Way by Alan Annand

★★★★☆

Animal Lovers' Warning (because I am one): A cat is injured, but his owner is caring and compassionate and gets him treatment. I did not find it offensive.

Before I write my review, I must reveal that I tend to dislike unrealistic police violence in a book. This book does have some of that. However, in having discussions with friends, I've come to realize that this seems to be what most readers want, so I will not take away a star for it as I'd originally intended. I recognize that writers need to give readers what they want.

The overblown police actions aside, the story line was good and I liked the main character. He was real and his flaws seemed natural, not forced by bizarre circumstances. In other words, I could relate to him.

I did think that his ten-year-old daughter seemed a tad too mature at times, but it's been some time since I had a lot of interaction with a ten-year-old, so maybe not.

I enjoyed the story and looked forward to my reading time each evening. I believe this was self-published, in which case it is a fine example that some authors who self-publish can write interesting stories with believable characters. It was well-formatted and well-written.

I will definitely be reading more of this author's work.

Ghost a la Mode (A Ghost of Granny Apples Mystery #1) by Sue Ann Jaffarian

★★★☆☆

Really two and half stars - because I wasn't overly tempted to abandon it. The writing style is pretty good, but I just didn't find the characters very believable.

The love interest is nasty and almost physically abusive to the main character, yet she finds him attractive? If someone manhandled me out of their home after I'd been invited in by another family member, I'd be tempted to call the police. What's with books that make violence (actual or hinted) a precursor to a relationship? I prefer a little bit of actual romance in my romance.

There were a few things that bothered me in this book. One was the use of the word hung instead of hanged. I believe hung is becoming more acceptable, but I was always taught that curtains were hung and people were hanged.

Possible semi-Spoilers:

The other was this: why would ANYONE in their right mind offer their own legally registered pistol to an untrained, unlicensed person? Not only is it illegal, it's downright stupid and more likely to get the person seriously injured or killed than protect them. It was just one more thing that made the characters seem unbelievable to me.

Finally, when the heroine gets rescued, it happens off-screen, so to speak - and one of the characters who actually rescues her is one we never really meet during the book! I thought that was really odd.

Price of Justice by Alan Brenham

★★★☆☆

I'll start by saying that I'm going to list the things I didn't like about this book, but I still enjoyed reading it. I did like the main character and I looked forward to sitting down with it each evening. Frankly, I don't usually complain about the occasional grammar error, but some of the other issues had me flipping back to fact check and that bothers me. If it had been better edited, I would have given it 4 stars.

I dislike when books switch between the first and third person. I really don't think the story was better served by this technique. Also, the tense is fairly inconsistent, most especially in the first person POV.

There are a few sections where Dani Mueller is speaking to her German parents. The author has the parents speak in German while Dani responds in English. The end result? You are almost given the mistaken impression that two different languages are being used, which begs the question if the parents speak English (because it appears as though they understand her when the conversation is written in two different languages), why wouldn't they speak it to her - or even more puzzling, why would Dani not speak their native language when addressing them? I believe it was done to add flavor, but those with a rudimentary knowledge of German will end up reading the same conversation twice, and even if the reader doesn't understand, Dani's responses (which reword what the parents said for those who didn't understand it) sound totally unrealistic for normal speech. For example, if the parents ask 'why didn't you tell us' her response would be 'I didn't tell you because ...' and every one of her responses has to be worded similarly. I think it would have been more effective to simply let the reader know the conversation was occurring in German and write it in English.

Possible spoilers:

I found some of the later scenarios a little implausible. The first 70% of the book was enjoyable, but the main character went a little 'off the reservation' toward the end. I understand there was motivation with regard to his daughter, but doing certain things which were at the least unethical and even some that were illegal in order to make a case seemed too far to me.

The mother-in-law that hated him and was trying to destroy his life was a bit overdone, too. Perhaps, if there had been some sort of prologue, maybe a scene at Scarsdale's wife's funeral wherein the MIL displayed irrational behavior, I would have found it more acceptable, but it seemed to come out of left field just to add more strife to Scarsdale's already stressful life.

Another character was supposed to have been paroled after spending six years in prison, but then is said to have been in court watching his brother's trial - an event that had only occurred two and a half years earlier. I think overall, the timeline was perhaps a little too short for some of the events that occurred.

Having said all of that, though, I truly enjoyed reading the book and I think this author is off to a great start. I look forward to reading future works by him.