Book Review: Everybody’s Daughter by Michael John Sullivan

My Review
0 of 5 stars

“Finished” July 13, 2013

I say finished in quotes because I got about 100 pages in and really just wanted the book done so I skipped pages, read chapter here and there and read the end and called is a mercy killing.

This was an awful book. You just can’t write a fiction that involves time travel and a subplot to the New Testament. I was totally fine with the concept of time-traveling and watching Jesus’ life, but not in meeting him and getting chummy.

I found the book to be offensive. The notes say that the author incorporates his own childhood into the stories he writes; a modern Medici. At its best it’s egotistical at worst sacrilegious. I didn’t really read the whole book and I won’t be reading any of the other titles encouraged in the notes at the end.

Book Review: Dead is Dead by James Gabriel

Finished reading on July 10, 2012

Book synopsis at Smashwords

Jake Thorne is a fixer for the MGM, the biggest and best of the Studio's that rule Hollywood's golden age. If you're a big shot, Jake will sober you up, pay off the cops and keep it out of the papers. So when a too-young girl shows up strangled in a big director's garden, Jake's on the job. But there's something about the girl that bothers him, and when the usually compliant cops try to warn him off, he decides to find out who she was. His search takes him into the world of abandoned girls, pimps and porn dealers, and into his own past where he is forced to confront who he was, what he did, and who he has become.


My review
1 of 5 stars

Writing a story with real people you don’t know is something only the very most experienced writers should attempt. The real people should have been edited out of this one. The only characters more trite and flat than the made-up people were the real ones.

This was another one of those stories that is told from a man’s point of view, told first person, in Hollywood’s golden era when men were all tough and women were either easy or your sister/mother. Real-life Hollywood stars weren’t just names dropped, but they had lines and everything. Joan Crawford was a major supporting character.

In the midst of all the hedonistic parties and murder is our main character that works for the film studio and is the only character in the book with a conscience. He feels bad that he was a sleaze in his youth. Everyone else grew up to be sleazier and criminal. I finished the book, but never expecting it to get better. In that, I wasn’t disappointed.

The book eventually ended with the main character finally understanding why things are so screwed up, why he is. And there is little to make the reader believe it changes anything.

Book Review: Dreamcast by Paul Telegdi

Finished reading on June 20, 2013

Book Synopsis at Good Reads

Imagine that you had a nightmare about your ex-girlfriend's murder and woke to find yourself accused of it! This is what confronts Travis Howard, a 23-year old art student struggling to prove his innocence while trapped in jail.

All evidence incriminates him, and the police are determined to break him. Isolated from family and friends, condemned by the community, Travis fights against the growing hopelessness of his situation. His only support is the psychologist assigned to assess him, who discovers latent psychic abilities which Travis has great difficulty accepting.
Increasingly, in this cauldron of conflict, he grows fond of her, but is not sure of her reactions. Gradually gaining confidence and learning to use his new-found talents, Travis tracks down the psychopathic killer to a fateful confrontation.


My review at Good Reads
2 out of 5 stars

At first it seemed trite and full of stereotypes, but told in first person, that was the main character’s naiveté. Some of his “learning about psychic ability was interesting and figuring out the crimes and the crimes themselves were okay but they were a lot more graphic than they needed to be for a book that was essentially 2 fairly brief books, The characters really weren’t developed and many aspects of then weren’t believable. The love story subplot in story 1 was unnecessary and unrealistic. The climaxes of both stories were good but brief and the ends seemed to rush to tie up to many loose ends

It's Mondaaaaay!

Break time is blog time in Naniland today! I’m celebrating Monday by joining Heather at Acting Balanced and Wayne at Touristic for the first Monday Quiz About Me in July!

1. What is your favorite summer activity?

If you are a regular reader at The Chronicles of Nani you know summer is all about seeing as many baseball games as possible!


2. Do you have a honey-do list? or a to-do-list of your own?

I try not to have a Honey-Do list, but there are some things I can’t do for myself. I always have a To-Do list, always have. I’ve always worked best writing things down and checking them off. Now I have it typed and highlight tasks as I complete them. I was a Franklin Planner addict when I was a producer, since my workweek was NEVER the same. I’ve been looking for decent planning software that would organize everything without maxing my processor or memory but be flexible and customizable. I want to be able to add a note in fewer than 2 clicks. I still use Word for lists because I haven’t found the software yet.


3. Would you go for a massage? Facial? Spa treatment?

Generally, I’m not crazy about being touched by strangers so a massage or spa treatment would be anything but relaxing or pleasurable. However, just the face, I can do. I had a facial a number of years back and enjoyed it, but I didn't like the oil-based product they iused. It left my face feeling kinda gummy. But I’d love a less greasy treatment! I always loved getting a manicure and the one time I got a pedicure it was alright, but honestly I like manicures better.


4. What was the last song you danced to?

I do still dance; just I do it more as exercise, holding on the counter in the kitchen and getting my legs and hips moving. I think the last song I danced to was Locked Out of Heaven by Bruno Mars.


Number five is for you to answer!

5. What was the last wild animal you saw?

Easy answer for me because the inspiration for the question just walked across the fence that separates us from the apartments next door. As a matter of fact that brown squirrel is still there patrolling. We also see groundhogs, rabbits an occasional deer and of course chipmunks. The deer always amaze me because we live so close to downtown.

You Mean It’s Not Tuesday?

Today’s title is for Edna. I left a comment at Miss Edna’s Place saying I thought I’d be back blogging on a regular basis Tuesday. Well, Tuesday was a busy day for me, with the holiday tomorrow I lose at least a day of phone calls and such. Yesterday was a day of leaving voice mails that included “I’m not sure what your holiday schedule is like, but if you could call back tomorrow or Monday…” Lucky for me, every call I made was returned yesterday and I have half of next week full of appointments! This afternoon I’ll be trying to get weekend baseball tickets and scheduling several busses for next week. So this is my “Tuesday Take 2” or Tuesday continued. With the Independence Day holiday tomorrow the days this week are a mish-mosh anyway.

There was no Monday Quiz About Me this week because our Canadian native hosts are visiting family in Canada and Monday was Canada Day! I hope everyone in Canada and Border States celebrated a great day. I include the Border States because of my own childhood as a border baby. I was born closer to Canada than Ohio and in Metro Detroit when I was growing up the entire week surrounding Canada Day on July 1 and Independence Day on July 4 was “freedom Week,” punctuated by the Detroit/Windsor Freedom Festival which included the huge fireworks display set off from a barge in the Detroit River. If you couldn’t or didn’t want to battle the traffic and crowds downtown, the fireworks display was always on TV. To me, Canada Day and Independence Day have always been a joined holiday and there has never been a question that if I wasn’t born American, Canadian is the only other nationality I could possibly want to be. Yeah, even though I’m proud of my dual citizenship and Sammarinese heritage, if I was picking of all the nations of the world to define my dual citizenship, I’d choose to be American-Canadian. I even know more French than Italian.

Now before I find myself editing because my intro addresses a Hodge Podge question (I copied and pasted but haven’t read the questions yet) I’ll get on to the Wednesday Hodge Podge!

1. What's one simple small pleasure on your summer 'to-do' list?

I think my new pleasure I want to indulge in this summer is getting out with the new powerchair. I can actually get out for fun without any increased fatigue from wheeling myself. I think maybe I’d like to treat myself to lunch at Panera Bread, where I can sit at an outside table with my Nook and a bowl of gazpacho with a salad; just me and just because. I miss doing that.


2. Do you have strong feelings or opinions regarding the immigration debate in your home country? Feel free to share your thoughts, but please play nice.

As a First Generation American I’ve always had very strong opinions about illegal vs. legal aliens in our country. My opinions have softened a little lately. There are so many other things wrong with this country and so many stupid things our government argues about to avoid real issues, I’m for a little amnesty to get it all done with and make our government go back to the old days when they served us. I still don’t want anyone who isn’t a citizen to vote.

But for illegals, and I don’t have a problem defining someone who is here illegally by their crime, it’s not “people who are not here legally” to me, but illegals who have been here and working for a very long time and haven’t broken any other laws should be given an opportunity to become legal aliens and pursue citizenship. We let the problem become too big to just fix it with anything absolute and I’d much rather see our government work on real issues instead of where someone’s parents were born and what religion should rule the formerly free and oppressed by religion again land. (Personal opinion, if your title isn’t Mr. or Ms. you don’t belong in government or talking about it to groups.)

I say let’s work on what the government can do to stimulate the economy, fix the medical crisis without spending all their time arguing about the band-aid and better ways to be safe but still free.


3. What's something in your home or wardrobe that could be described as 'star spangled'?

Um… The All Star Game on TV? ;)


4. Is your house set up for a party?

Absolutely not! We have one party at Christmastime and that would be a small party by many standards. Neither one of us likes big parties and I don’t ever see us even wanting to host one.


5. What one never-before-visited city in America, would you most like to see?

I want to visit San Antonio (by way of Luling, Texas to see and photograph the watermelon water tower.)


6. Your favorite red food? White food? Blue food?

These are my favorites right now. They could be different as soon as tonight.

Favorite red food: gazpacho
Favorite White food: Baseball Nut ice cream (vanilla base with cashews and swirl of raspberry) or vanilla Greek yogurt
Favorite Blue food: Blue (food coloring)buttercream frosting…I guess you could put it on a cake, but a spoon is fine too


7. What freedom do you value the most, and why?

Speech. I value to right to disagree with my government and I greatly value my responsibility to call my country out when I think it’s wrong. Being a patriot is more than waving a flag; sometimes it’s putting that flag down and demanding the country restore itself.


8. Insert your own random thought here.

The thing about random thoughts is that I usually get out a lot of randomness in my intro and anything else is addressed in my answers to the questions, so I’m not feeling so random by the last of the Hedge Podge.

I’ll wish everyone celebrating this week to enjoy your countries’ holidays safely but with vigor.