Review: Cold Tea by Dart l Wooden

Rating: 4.5⭐️

I know little about this author but Cold Tea is an amazing story. Written in spare, often quiet language, it’s a tale of a Quaker young woman who flees from her farm life and set future in her religious Quaker settlement in Pennsylvania for freedom and a new life in a mining town in Colorado. 

Hearing of an offer of marriage from her mother that’s coming as she’s watching the women around her Quaker community, Ruth Ellison decides that obedience and silence aren’t enough for her and the train going west is her only choice. 

Ruth’s journey, in her drab well worn garb, her courage and determination as well as absolute naïveté about what she encounters is realistically laid out in the narrative. We’re drawn in by her highly detailed observations of those around her, the movements of the townspeople and the dynamics that make it work. On multiple levels and sometimes duplicitous fronts. 

She chooses her direction and destiny. And a new name. 

And every person and each possible path open to Ruth feels both raw, deep and powerfully alive in future opportunities. Wooden’s storytelling has the reader fully emerged in Ruth’s life and journey along with the rest of the characters of Mercy House and the survival of this cold, hard mining town. 

 

I was so invested that even after it ended, I was still pondering their future and what came next. 

Incredible work. Highly recommended. 

Buy link

Cold Tea: A Novel of the Colorado Frontier

Blurb 

She came west with forty-three dollars and a different name.

Pennsylvania nearly buried Ruth Ellison alive — in silence, in obedience, in a future already decided for her. So she ran. She stepped off the train in a Colorado boom town with a stranger’s name lifted off a whiskey crate, and walked through the red-lantern door of the only house that would take her.

They serve cold tea in whiskey glasses at Mercy House. The men tip better when they think a woman is drinking along with them. Eleanor Vale learns that first. Then she learns the ledgers — who owes, who pays, who disappears when the numbers stop adding up.

She is good with numbers. 

Dangerously good. And in a town built on loneliness, coal smoke, and money that moves quietly beneath every handshake, the woman who keeps the books ends up holding the whole town’s secrets.

Then a man dies on the parlor floor, and Eleanor discovers exactly what she is capable of.

A luminous, spare novel about survival, complicity, and the terrible arithmetic of becoming someone new — for readers of News of the World, The Whistling Season, and Paulette Jiles.

Who pays? Someone always does.

July 16, 2026

Language

‎English

Print length

204 pages

Check out the latest release “P.S. I Love You“ by Meg Macy (Tour and excerpt)

Review: P.S. I Love You - Meg Macy

Meg Macy has a new MM contemporary book out, Love is Love book three: P.S. I Love You.

Jackson Riley and Juliette (aka Jules) Baxter are enmeshed in new situations. Jack fled his latest trauma to act in a rom-com film, taking a break from his relationship with Reese, but now regrets his impulsiveness. His ex-lover Kyle is the least of his problems when odd things happen on set and off.

Jules and Chris are committed to their new love affair and in charge of the breakfast café and a new bakery, but keeping on top of employees and finances is not yet a “piece of cake.” Family problems also plague Jules and Reese, while Jack discovers that acting in a film is totally different than acting on the stage.

Will he ever answer Reese’s barrage of texts and voicemails? Will Reese solve the mystery of Jack’s mysterious past?

Warnings: Past trauma.

About the Series:

In the Love Is Love series, these LGBTQA+ contemporary romance novels explore past hurts, healing, and the vulnerability of gay love and acceptance. Friendship, trust, courage, and resilience unite to combat fear and homophobia in reshaping lives and communities.

Amazon


Excerpt

Life sometimes throws you a curveball out of nowhere. You either react fast and catch it, or you’re blindsided when it smacks you in the head. The latter applies to Jack Riley’s man, for sure. Reese Baxter missed the worst signs of trouble in their relationship.

Jack knows all about those curveballs, too, after surviving on the streets. He shivers after stepping out of the shower and checks the new tattoo on his upper arm. It’s healed, for the most part, but his skin has raised goosebumps. Michigan ain’t that far from Ontario, but damn. It’s fucking cold in Canada. When he first woke, he caught a glimpse of fat snowflakes outside the window against the darkness. Back in Ann Arbor, he wore shorts and a tee in a string of days with upper sixties temperatures. No need for a coat or a hoodie.

“Jesus. I’m gettin’ to be an old man bitchin’ about the damned weather.”

The patio installation at the café must be almost finished for the one year celebration. Jack wouldn’t blame his bestie and co-owner, Jules Baxter, for going ahead without him. Not that he knows what’s happening, since he ain’t answered any anyone’s texts. After packing a suitcase, donning a sweatshirt he stole from Reese, Jack rode with Kyle Kingston to this town in Canada to share an old house with his ex-lover’s friends. At least until they find out where they’re gonna be sent for the film production.

After toweling dry, Jack dons boxer briefs, jeans, a tee shirt, plus a wool and cashmere ice blue hoodie sweater he bought in Vegas. Takes out his makeup kit, adds moisturizer and bronzer. When his phone on the counter buzzes with a text, his hand slips. Cursing under his breath, he ignores the phone and wipes off his ruined eyeliner. Decides to go femboy with shimmery lavender shadow on his eyelids, contour and blush, then uses setting spray. He brushes and styles his hair, applies lip oil. At a loud crash, Jack rushes out of the bathroom.

“What the hell, King! You okay?”

Muffled mumbling reaches his ears. Kyle rises from the floor, hands blindly groping, and slides back under the covers. “Do I look okay? Goddammit,” he grumbles. “You didn’t have to insist on twin beds, Tink.”

“Fuck off. You’re gonna be late if you ain’t got an alarm set.”

He throws a pillow at Jack. “Go fuck yourself. I need more sleep.”

“’Cause you got drunk last night.”

Kyle pulls the covers over his head. Jack chose to ignore everyone last night, since the table read today is stressful enough. Jack kept waking up, the party keeping him from much needed sleep. Deep snores from the other bedrooms reach his ears now. He failed to memorize his dialogue due to the noise. Hope he don’t bomb today. Reese always helped him relax, rubbing his back, huggin’ or kissin’ him. Jack misses seeing his man’s deep blue eyes, dark hair, scruffy jaw, that broad smile. He inserts his earbuds and chooses a playlist.

After tossing his kit on the flimsy bed, Jack heads to the kitchen. Good thing he set the machine up last night to brew at five a.m. Yawning, he fills two paper cups with black coffee. Adds lids to each… Until their production assistant can find a better place, he’s stuck here with actor friends of Kyle’s. Decent guys but total slobs.

Having to share a room is another bone of contention. No way is Jack gonna film all day for two or three months with his ex-lover and deal with him all night, too. He wants privacy to chill on his own. That better happen, or he’s gonna pitch a fuckin’ fit.

But Jack smiles to hear Conan Gray’s song, “Maniac.” Perfect choice, given how he ended up here with Kyle. His ex abandoned him, then turned up again outta the blue. Wantin’ him back, despite Jack bein’ with Reese now. He shoulda never let him get under his skin.

Donning his boots, heavy parka, and gloves, Jack slings his backpack on one shoulder and carries the coffee cups into the cold. His breath steams in the air. He curses when a sip of coffee burns his tongue. It’s a ten minute walk to the table read location, but he ain’t in the mood to wait for Kyle. Too restless, Jack figures the fresh air will help clear his head. And bein’ early might make a good impression on the director.

Whatever that’s worth.

His homesickness keeps getting worse, his misery deep. Jack tramps on. Every step fails to ease his jumpy nerves. Why did he agree to do this film? For the money, of course, helping the café survive. They got so far in the red, Jack worried they’d lose everything. Until Reese stepped up and took over without telling him, renovating a building on the other side of the café’s parking lot into the Sunshine Bakery. That was a smart move. Less than a month after it opened, profits are paying off some of the debt.

But his man stepped over the line, not telling him he paid half the new patio’s cost with Jules. “Too fuckin’ late to quit this rom-com,” Jack says aloud. “I’m an asshole, lettin’ Kyle talk me into it. I should be at the café, not a stupid table read.”

Jack wished he listened to Stevie’s advice before running off. Regret hits him now. He misses Reese, bad. Seeing his man, sharing meals, cuddling after sex and playing with his chest hair, waking early to see him, his cheeks flushed, hair mussed, naked under a sheet. Or without anything covering his muscular shoulders, arms, and ass. Jack loved to watch Reese sleep or wake up, grumpy and silent, until he drinks coffee.

“Dammit. Stop being so fucking stubborn and text him…”


Author Bio

National bestselling author Meg Macy first dreamed of seeing a book with her name on it in the school library. She’s always found comfort, adventure, and connection in books—which might explain why she now writes stories that offer all three.

Meg writes LGBTQIA+ romance with a touch of spice, intrigue, and plenty of emotional payoff in the LOVE IS LOVE series. M/M romance and M/F polyamory, her stories are comfort reads with a twist. She’s also written cozy mysteries for Kensington, the Shamelessly Adorable Teddy Bear series, and is one half of the D.E. Ireland team for the Agatha-Award nominated historical mysteries featuring Eliza Doolittle & Henry Higgins.

She lives with her writing companion, Mr. Whiskers the cat, and prefers pages to parties.

Author Website: http://www.megmacy.com

Author Facebook (Personal): https://www.facebook.com/authormegmacy/

Author Facebook (Author Page): https://www.facebook.com/MegMacyAuthor

Author Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/meg.macy.author/

Author Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15751255.Meg_Macy

Author QueeRomance Ink: https://www.queeromanceink.com/mbm-book-author/meg-macy/

Author Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Meg-Macy/author/B01N3KTK1N

Other Worlds Ink logo

Review: Bonds of the Forsaken (Forbidden Flight Book 3) by H.G. Chambers

Rating: 4.5⭐️

Bonds of the Forsaken brings the Forbidden Flight fantasy series to a satisfying conclusion. 

H. G. Chambers takes Kiva, and Noor, her bonded kiraeen , and Kahalil, a sage, on a thrilling adventure to save her people and Medina Basin from the Red God. 

Already so many from Medina Basin have perished. Kiva taking for herself the burden of their loss, rightly or wrongly,  because of the last battle. Layered on top of which is the devastating death of Noor’s mate and her fiancé’s kiraeen bondmate. With deeply cutting emotional consequences. 

To find the necessary power and magic to defeat the Red God, Kiva must fly through lands to find people she’s never seen before to accomplish her goals and return home safely in time. 

It’s an emotionally charged and satisfying journey. Kiva’s full of anger and grief and realistic fears about herself and her own personal struggles here and abilities to achieve her goals. Chambers crafts new and exciting landscapes and cultures for Kiva and Noor to experience, in every way possible. Ones that will challenge them and their bond in surprising ways and their own will to survive. 

The final result and battles are epic. The resolution for Kiva and Noor and Medina Basin one that’s feels realistic for all sides, grounded in the events, the growth and development of the individuals. 

And Chambers leaves it open ended enough so that he can revisit it and see where Kiva and Noor’s journey’s takes them. 

As I said, highly satisfactory. And a series I definitely recommend reading for all ages. 

Cover Design: vividcovers

Windwalker Series: 

Forbidden Flight #1

Order of the Red Sons #2

Bonds of the Forsaken #3

Buy link

        Windwalker: Bonds of the Forsaken

    

Blurb 

A city under siege. A god’s wrath. One woman’s fight to save everything she loves.

Madina Basin is under relentless attack from the sharun sand-warrior demons. Determined to stop them once and for all, Kiva leads a daring offensive—only to discover the true power behind the sharun is far more dangerous than she ever imagined.

Now, her only hope to save her people is an ancient artifact with the power to challenge a god. To claim it, she must embark on an epic journey across shifting deserts, perilous forests, and towering mountains. But the weight of her past threatens to destroy her from within, and if she can’t overcome her anger, guilt, and grief, it may consume her first.

Can Kiva conquer her inner demons and secure the artifact in time, or will she return home to find everyone she loves lost forever?

Grab your copy now and join the adventure!

August 18, 2020

Language

‎English

Print length

358 pages

Book 3 of 3

Windwalker

Check out the Cover Reveal Info for “In Love and War” by Beryll & Osiris Brackhaus (post and tour)

In Love and War - The First Lotus Knights, by Beryll & Osiris Brackhaus

Beryll & Osiris Brackhaus have a new queer sci-fantasy romance out (gay, bi, poly): In Love and War – The First Lotus Knights.

It is the year 1985 ET. House Virasana has fallen, the Lotus Throne stands empty, and a bitter succession war has every noble House at arms. To make things worse, House Tô-Genji and House Medina are locked in a vicious feud over a flood of cheap illicit drugs tearing their worlds apart.

Prince Li Lan Tô-Genji is as far from the fighting as one can be. Third son of the Duke of Qufu, Li Lan is the family scholar – kept behind palace walls to preserve tradition, etiquette, and history. Brilliant, restless, and quietly furious at a life chosen for him, he steals what little freedom he can.

Sir Wilhelm Grebenstein arrives with a delegation seeking the Duke’s support for the Grebenstein claimant to the Lotus Throne. An expert swordfighter and genuine hero, he is not much taken with the dirty business of politics, but rather with the brilliant and resourceful third son of the Duke…

Then, Sir Saïd, a dashing Medina knight, is taken prisoner and exhibited in the castle of Li Lan’s father, awaiting an uncertain fate. Yet Li Lan finds him to be an honourable, passionate warrior and both of them are deeply intrigued by each other.

Saving Saïd would be treason. Leaving him would be complicity. Forced into an impossible choice, Li Lan and Wilhelm help Saïd escape – the three flee together, lighting a fuse that will reshape the Virasana Empire. Hunted across a realm in upheaval, they’ll have to fight for their lives, for their love and the reckless hope of an Empire actually worth fighting for.

A swashbuckling queer throuple romance set in the beloved Virasana Empire universe, this standalone space-opera adventure by award-winning authors Beryll and Osiris Brackhaus blends passion, peril, hope, and humour with just the right amount of heat.

Universal Buy Link


Author Bio

Beryll and Osiris Brackhaus are a couple currently living their happily ever after in the very heart of Germany, under the stern but loving surveillance of their three black cats. Both of them are voracious but picky readers, love telling stories and drinking tea, good food and the occasional violent movie. Together, they write novels of adventure and romance, hoping to share a little of their happiness with their readers.

An artist at heart, Beryll was writing stories even before she knew what letters were. As easily inspired as she is frustrated, her own work is never good enough (in her eyes). A perfectionist both in the best and worst sense of the word and the driving creative force of their duo.

An entertainer and craftsman in his approach to writing, Osiris is the down-to-earth, practical part of the duo. Broadly interested in almost every subject and skill, with a sunny mood and caring personality, he strives to bring the human nature into focus of each of their stories.

Author Website: https://www.brackhaus.com

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Review: ABBY, SKYLAR, AND GWYN’S AWESOME APPRENTICESHIP ADVENTURES (Jon’s Mysteries and Mack’s Marvelous Manifestations Short Stories ) by AJ Sherwood 

Rating: 3🌈

This group of 3 short stories is a bit of a mixed bag to be honest. Centered around the teenage characters from AJ Sherwood’s Jon’s Mysteries and Mack’s Marvelous Manifestations series they range from problematic to interesting.

Spoilers:

I didn’t expect this, especially considering such cool characters to work with. 

AITA for Telling My Friend She’s Being Cheated On? This is the story I have major concerns about. Abby, and Skylar are both high school students with powerful magical abilities. One being able to read people. See relationships, health issues. In this case it’s that a friend is being cheated on. Fine. But it’s not the issue. 

The boy is not well liked. Nor is the girl who he’s having the other relationship with. Again not the problem. Although not handled well. 

The issue? Abby reads that the other girl is pregnant, a fact she doesn’t realize herself. Nor does he. 

All extremely serious, private sensitive information. Want to guess how it’s going to be handled? Yep announced to those involved by Abby at school. With no adults present until much later. 

Nowhere is there any discussion on ethics or ramifications of this matter.  We all know how deadly high school is.  None of this matters.  Abby has outed the cheaters. 

This was almost a DNF moment. 

The rest was just ok. Honestly after that. I was done.

The second story saw Gwyn settling in and the third was about ghostly call that went sideways. 

But that first? Nope. Poorly executed and not well executed. 

Where’s the ethics here? 

No recommendations.

Cover by Katie Griffin

Buy link

Amazon.comhttps://www.amazon.comAbby, Skylar, and Gwyn’s Awesome Apprenticeship Adventures …

Blurb 

Have a Mack’s Horribly Hellacious Ghost Town hangover and need more? Here are three new short stories featuring the apprentices from Jon’s Mysteries and Mack’s Marvelous Manifestations! Each story is about a first of some kind, learning moments for the girls.

Note: Gwyn was introduced in Mack’s Horribly Hellacious Ghost Town. It is recommended you read that book first, but it’s not necessary.

AITA for Telling My Friend She’s Being Cheated On?

One of Jon’s first lessons to me had been to mind my own business. He’d stressed to me that life would be better for me all around if I kept everything to myself unless someone asked for information. Or unless the situation called for me to reveal that secret.

I, uh, had no idea which heading this fell under.

All in the Family

I think anyone in my shoes would be nervous. I was meeting people who would be in my life for years to come. People who didn’t have to like me. Brandon and Mack assured me it’d be fine, that everyone in their family was easygoing and I’d become part of the family, but still. My own parents didn’t like me. How could I expect anyone else to?

First Time for Everything

Lazy Saturday morning with nothing to do? Check.

Unexpected ghosts needing passing? Check.

Being attacked by a ghost without Mack around to help? Uh…help?!

Tags:
apprentices, short stories, side stories, BAMF girls, milestones, ghosts, energy reading, AITA, found family, chosen family, F/F romance, psychics, bonds, Gwyn does her first exorcism, Eli

Review:  Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea (Tomes and Tea Book 1) by Rebecca Thorne 

Rating: 4.5🌈

Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea, the first book in the cozy LGBT romance fantasy Tomes and Tea series by Rebecca Thorne, has an totally different feel than the excellent Moss’d N Space novel I just finished by this writer. 

Slower paced, more to the journey of the couple and the establishment of their new shop than the other space adventure. But the relationship between the two characters, the dynamics and the way Thorne builds her community is just as excellent and thorough. 

The women, each with their fears and strengths about their decision to leave and have a future together in Tawny, despite the ramifications, have relatable moments and credibility here. From talks about power imbalance to money, it’s a relationship between adults who want to make sure their relationship works. 

Even with magic, dragons, bandits, and a psychopath of a queen behind them. 

Reyna, the Queen’s Guard and Kianthe, the Mage of the Ages, fleeing to set up a tea and book shop in the cold hinterlands was a dream, until it became clear that Reyna needed to leave before she became a casualty of the Queen’s cruelty. 

The town of Tawney, its citizens are beautifully drawn. They are soon become part of this couple’s found family and new life. 

And there’s a mystery a foot that needs to be solved, and that’s will take investigating as well as a journey. 

And dragons. 

A slower delight and cozy fantasy mystery that I absolutely enjoyed. 

Another wonderful tale to share. 

Cover art by Irene Huang 

Cover typography by Amphi 

Map by Rebecca Thorne 

Chapter ornaments by Amphi 

Tip-in illustration by Eilene Cherie

Includes the short story:

“Meet and Greet” by Rebecca Thorne

Tomes & Tea (4 book series):

Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea #1

A Pirate’s Life for Tea #2

Tea You at the Altar #3

Alchemy and a Cup of Tea #4

Buy link

 Book 1 of 4: Tomes & Tea 

Blurb 

In the tradition of Legends & Lattes, comes a cozy fantasy steeped in sapphic romance about one of the Queen’s private guards and a powerful mage who want to open a bookshop and live happily ever after…if only the world would let them.

All Reyna and Kianthe want is to open a bookshop that serves tea. Worn wooden floors, plants on every table, firelight drifting between the rafters… all complemented by love and good company. Thing is, Reyna works as one of the Queen’s private guards, and Kianthe is the most powerful mage in existence. Leaving their lives isn’t so easy.

But after an assassin takes Reyna hostage, she decides she’s thoroughly done risking her life for a self-centered queen. Meanwhile, Kianthe has been waiting for a chance to flee responsibility–all the better that her girlfriend is on board. Together, they settle in Tawney, a town nestled in the icy tundra near dragon country, and open the shop of their dreams.

What follows is a cozy tale of mishaps, mysteries, and a murderous queen throwing the realm’s biggest temper tantrum. In a story brimming with hurt/comfort and quiet fireside conversations, these two women will discover just what they mean to each other… and the world.

Bramble

Publication date

July 10, 2023

Language

‎English

Print length

345 pages

Book 1 of 4

Tomes & Tea

Review: My Emergency Contact Is A Wolf Shifter by Roxie Ray

Rating: 4.5 ⭐️

The authors writing under the name Roxie Ray have another really well crafted, emotional and surprisingly layered paranormal tale about two people, a potty-mouthed parrot, who find themselves in a relationship, and moving forward with their lives and fixing their issues along the way. 

That one is a wolf shifter who’s been estranged from his shifter community is an even better element. 

Therapy and therapists play a key role here for three characters, the first being a young girl who is a new neighbor of Zoey Yates. 

Zoey, who just moved to the new apartment and town in the Adirondacks for boundaries with her mother and their toxic relationship, is immediately “adopted” by Bobbi, her young neurodivergent neighbor. Bobbi appears often unannounced , backpack in hand, to interact with Zoey and Markie, Zoey, rescue African Grey parrot. Love that parrot btw. Hilarious. 

The characters and their dynamics are incredibly well executed and beautifully written. It’s a layered and believable relationship that develops as they, especially Zoey who wants to remain emotionally independent, starts to accept Bobbi and others as part of her circle. 

That includes Liam, the wolf shifter who ends up as her emergency contact. How that happens is hilarious and honestly, something that you can see happening. 

Liam too is someone who is in need of help, which he acknowledges. The need for protection stemming from his background. 

This is a thoughtfully written, well plotted book, funny, yes,I was absolutely laughing at parts, as well as having small moments of poignant realism, as with  Mr. Hardan.   

It was over far too soon. I found such joy in the company of these characters, the journey that Zoey had to take felt almost familiar in places, and so many truths were uttered here. 

Again, it’s that cover. Threw me totally. What’s that saying? Can’t trust a book by its cover? This book is so much better than the cute cover. 

Pick it up and read it for yourself. 

Highly recommended. 

Buy link

Amazon.comhttps://www.amazon.comMy Emergency Contact is a Wolf Shifter – Ray, Roxie

Blurb 

Zoey Yates doesn’t ask for help. She fixes things, handles things, and keeps a carefully maintained emotional perimeter around everything that matters. She has a plan, a parrot with a helpdesk vocabulary, and absolutely zero feelings about the wolf shifter she listed as her emergency contact after knowing him for approximately six hours.

Zero feelings. Completely fine.

The hospital called him anyway. He drove forty minutes in thirty-two. Now he’s in her apartment, cooking eggs she didn’t ask for, and her parrot—who has never liked anyone—has accepted a head scratch. Liam sits across the room, not beside her, because she hasn’t invited anything closer. He waits. He doesn’t push.

Zoey has spent her whole life being the person who shows up. She doesn’t have a protocol for someone who shows up for her.

She’s building one. Against her will. Slightly faster than planned.

My Emergency Contact is a Wolf Shifter is a steamy standalone paranormal romance about a woman who guards everything and the wolf who waited at the door

Special Fiction Books

Publication date

June 16, 2026

Language

‎English

Print length

355 pages

Review: Wave Rider (Verdant String Book 1) by Michelle Diener

Rating :4.5⭐️

Wave Rider is the fifth book the Verdant String series but unlike other series, these stories are written as standalone novels and can be read separately from each other. 

The Verdant String are a group of green life bearing planets from 5 solar systems that make up the Verdant String Coalition. So the stories feature various species and worlds different from each other. 

I picked up Wave Rider because I really liked the premise of the book. An isolated woman scientist on an icy planet, a pod of water beings that sounds similar to whales, and a mysterious plot unfolding around her. 

There’s also an indigenous peoples who are wave riders who collect a substance similar to baleen and a matriarchal society. 

So many interesting elements here that I found myself wishing that the author had explored some of these in even more detail. Just so many great ideas and storylines here and not enough page time for them all. 

Anna and Cal, the team and even the relationships forming with the leviathan pods deserve a sequel. 

I’m so invested in this story and characters that I want to see more of them.

A new find and series by this author.  Recommended!

Cover Design: Creative Paramita

Verdant String series:

Each book in the series can be read as a standalone: 

Interference & Insurgency Box Set 

Breakaway 

Breakeven 

Trailblazer 

High Flyer 

Wave Rider 

Peace Maker

Buy link

 Book 5 of 8: Verdant String 

Blurb 

Isolated . . . Verdant String scientist, Anja Farucci, is frightened. Her calls for help from her remote coastal research station on the moon planet Fynian have been going unanswered, and strange things are happening with the leviathan pod she’s studying. Out of options, she sets out on the dangerous three-day journey to Rinc, the moon’s only city.

Stranded . . . Cal is a wave rider, and if anyone understands leviathans, it’s him, but when Kada, a young leviathan, grabs his boat and strands him on the southern peninsula, Cal is at a loss to understand what is going on.

Thrown together . . . When Cal and Anja cross paths, they discover Anja’s communications have been deliberately sabotaged. Someone doesn’t want anyone coming or going from the southern peninsula. When the people involved start hurting leviathans, though, neither Cal nor Anja can let it go.

What they don’t know, as they get deeper and deeper into the mystery, is that the secret they discover in the cold waters of Fynian’s ocean will change them forever.

WAVE RIDER is the fifth book set in the world of the Verdant String. Like the other books in the series, it can be read as a standalone novel.

The planets of the Verdant String, the green, fecund sources of life spanning five solar systems, comprise the Verdant String Coalition. This is the setting for the science fiction romance series from award-winning novelist Michelle Diener. While the people of the Verdant String know they have a common ancestor, a group of explorers who colonized the planets at the same time thousands of years ago, the mysteries of who they were, and where they came from, persist. 

Each book in the series can be read as a standalone: 

Interference & Insurgency Box Set 

Breakaway 

Breakeven 

Trailblazer 

High Flyer 

Wave Rider 

Peace Maker

Eclipse

Publication date

July 11, 2021

Language

‎English

Print length

284 pages

Book 5 of 8

Verdant String

Review: Order of the Red Sons (Forbidden Flight Book 2) by H.G. Chambers

Rating: 4.5⭐️

Order of the Red Sons, the second novel in the Forbidden Flight YA fantasy series by H.G. Chambers, takes Kiva’s tale of her journey to become her clan’s female windwalker towards a dark, treacherous place . 

Chambers has beautifully crafted a desert world where the people have long dug out an ages old survival among a hidden village place inside a desert cliff . There’s a  sense of an ancient civilization and laws that have arisen inside the rock walls is authentic and believable. So when Kiva goes against tradition of “men windwalkers” only, it’s an also a real issue for her here to go against their religion and laws. For her and her family. 

Order of the Red Sons sees the ramifications of her achieving her goals and bonding with her own kiraeen and becoming a windwalker. There’s an entire order within her village dedicated to stopping her and any other women who might follow her to become windwalkers. They believe she’s an abomination and should be punished. 

Who is a part of this secret society and what their ultimate goal is pushes this powerful storyline. It’s high action, even higher emotional energy, with betrayal and violence at every level.

All happening across richly described desert scenery and vividly imagined areas. And the culture is crafted in great detail by the author so it’s absolutely essential to the story and realistic. 

Order of the Red Sons (Forbidden Flight Book 2) by H.G. Chambers is even better than the first and now I can’t wait to read the third. 

What a fantastic series this is.Highly recommended.

Cover Design: vividcovers

Windwalker Series: 

Forbidden Flight #1

Order of the Red Sons #2

Bonds of the Forsaken #3

Buy link

        Windwalker: Order of the Red Sons

    

Blurb 

Betrayed by those she vowed to protect.

Kiva’s world shatters when a group of masked men attacks her within the walls of her own city. Forced to flee or risk the lives of everyone she loves, she learns the attackers are the Order of the Red Sons, a fanatical group bent on returning Madina Basin to a time when female windwalkers were forbidden.

As their influence grows, Kiva discovers that even the people closest to her are vulnerable to the Order’s dangerous propaganda. But the true threat lies far deeper—hidden in the twisted heart of the Order’s leader, whose dark plans could destroy everything Kiva holds dear.

Can Kiva stop the Red Sons before their victory leads to ruin for Madina Basin?

Grab your copy now and dive into an epic tale of betrayal, survival, and forbidden power.

Review: Dark Minds (Class 5 Book 3) by Michelle Diener

Rating: 4.5⭐️

Dark Minds is one that adds in deeper layers of knowledge to the overall expansion of this series universe in terms of understanding the AI beings and how they are involved with the abduction of the women.  And their own enslavement by the Tecran and struggles to become aware and free themselves. 

Imogene Peters is in a different situation than the previous women.  She’s been in a secret facility and she desperate situation as she escapes is suspenseful and emotional.  It’s so well written that the reader feels right there with her in her desperate flight to escape her captors. 

Captain Camlar Kalor, the Grih captain who was in charge of a mission to rescue a human woman, is captured and is taken prisoner along with his crew. 

This plot really differs from the previous storylines as does how the AI or thinking machine becomes involved. 

Gripping plot, and emotional twists. 

One of my favorites in a series I’m loving. 

A another winner from an author who’s becoming an auto read. 

Class 5 Series (7 book series)

Dark Horse #1

Dark Deeds #2

Dark Minds #3

Dark Matters #4

Dark Class #5

Collision Course #6

Crash Course #7

Buy link

        Dark Minds (Class 5 Series Book 3)

    

Blurb 

The mind is the most powerful weapon of all . . .

Imogen Peters knows she’s a pawn. She’s been abducted from Earth, held prisoner, and abducted again. So when she gets a chance at freedom, she takes it with both hands, not realizing that doing so will turn her from pawn to kingmaker.

Captain Camlar Kalor expected to meet an Earth woman on his current mission, he just thought he’d be meeting her on Larga Ways, under the protection of his Battle Center colleague. Instead, he and Imogen are thrown together as prisoners in the hold of a Class 5 battleship. When he works out she’s not the woman who sparked his mission, but another abductee, Cam realizes his investigation just got a lot more complicated, and the nations of the United Council just took a step closer to war.

Imogen’s out of her depth in this crazy mind game playing out all around her, and she begins to understand her actions will have a massive impact on all the players. But she’s good at mind games. She’s been playing them since she was abducted.

Guess they should have left her minding her own business back on Earth…

Eclipse

Publication date

July 22, 2016

Language

‎English

Print length

348 pages

Book 3 of 7

Class 5 Series