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Out of Time is a well crafted paranormal romance story that centers around two characters, Simon and Elizabeth. Through means I won’t spoil, they go back in time to just before the Great Depression, and are stuck there until they figure out a way home. During their time together, they realize their feelings for one another, all while trying to survive in a time that isn’t their own.

The first half of the novel is amazing. The time travel is well done and fascinating, and the romance between the two leads is built up slowly and believably. I don’t read many novels with a romance at its core, so I don’t know the typical process. But the author didn’t drag out the romance throughout the entire novel, and this is a good thing. To me, that would be a little tedious.

It’s the second half of the novel, when a vampire is introduced, that kinda lost me. I definitely admire the guts this took and the imagination. I’ve never heard of a vampire / time travel / romance story before. But in this case, for me, the second half just didn’t work. I would like to have seen more time travel elements, and omit the vampire entirely.

My only other complaint concerns the amount of random happenings to Elizabeth. Between capturing the attention of a vampire, getting mugged, getting held at gunpoint in a bar, just too much “random” stuff happened to her.

However, nitpicks aside, awesome novel that I had to finish. The first half alone is better than a lot of entire books I’ve read.

Strengths:

• Excellent characters, especially Simon, Elizabeth, and the extras (Charlie and Dix).
• The romantic and time travel elements are awesome.
• The setting, pre Great Depression, excellent.

Weaknesses:

• Vampire element, while original and imaginative, didn’t work for me.
• Suspension of belief a little shaky when asked to assume so many random bad things can happen to one person. Elizabeth should at least carry a horseshoe or something.

These Hellish Happenings is one of the most unique, and brave, books I’ve ever read. I’ve read books that have given us an alternate view of Hell before, but Jennifer has created a very entertaining version. Hellish is a very funny novel, and it dared to go in a direction I didn’t think it would. I won’t say to spoil anyone, but let me say I did not see the romance in the story coming at me at all 🙂 Everything about Hellish is different, from the version of Hell it presents all the way down to the “normal” vampire main character.

Strengths:

• Very memorable characters
• Amazing setting

Weaknesses:

• It didn’t bother me, but some people will not go for the romantic angle

A very solid detective / paranormal story. Death Has a Name centers around a psychic detective named Brodie Wade. I like the universe that Jerry created here. At least with Brodie, he just doesn’t see visions or touch and know things, like your typical psychics. In this he deal with the Truth. The Truth is like a universe mirrored onto our own, with apparitions and entities, and Wade can communicate in that realm. But if he doesn’t listen to what they have to say, they can actually harm him.

It was a very fast paced read, very entertaining. The only thing I could really find at fault was that I wanted to learn more about these characters. How did Wade and Dawson meet? Was there ever going to be anything between Wade and the police office he befriended, Jamie? Or even between him and his lawyer, Emily?

Despite these few shortcomings, all this does is tell me that Jerry created a cool world and characters I would like to learn more about, and that is a good thing.

Strengths:

• Fast paced read, no fluff.
• Interesting settings and characters.
• I liked the tie in to Passover.

Weaknesses:

• Would like to have known more about  the characters.

There’s nothing like a well told short story. With minimal pages and words, Jennifer Hudock manages to tell a nice little ghost tale. She establishes setting and characters with minimal fuss. On Raven Wings is a cool story about a ghost coming back to enlist some help for justice. It took me just a little over a few hours to read it, and it’s worth the read.

Strengths:

• Well written. I could see everything she described in my head.
• Characters are setup very quickly. No wasted words or descriptions.
• Ghosts. We all love ghosts.

Weaknesses:

• Just a few proofreading type things. Looks like maybe a missing word or two, and two periods mating together. 🙂  Did not detract from the story at all though.

JL Bryan makes a trip to Not Really Southern Vamp Chick, link here, to promote his latest book “The Haunted E-Book”.

I’ve read and reviewed JL’s book Jenny Pox. It was definitely awesome, something I like to write about myself (main character has special powers). It was told a good horror / paranormal tale, and had a solid romance to go along with it too. JL’s also been very helpful on the Kindleboards, he helped me come up with my blurb for Demonspawn. 🙂 So definitely stop by and check him out.

Sunrise at Sunset is a very interesting twist on the vampire stories I’ve read lately. Instead of the main character being a smoldering male vampire who goes after the human female, the roles are reversed this time. I think this is the book’s strength and weakness. It was a refreshing change, and I honestly didn’t know how the story would play out. I also like the fact that this story kept the traditional rule of “sunlight kills”. A lot of vampire stories are trying to get away from this rule lately, and I liked that this rule was kept.

The story I feel is more romance than vampire action, and that was fine with me. It tells a nice story of girl meets boy, girl courts boy, and let the action begin. The characters were definitely interesting, especially the vampires. The main weak link was the male human lead. It truly is an unbalanced relationship, and I can only guess that was the intention, but it was hard to read through those parts where it was focused on. A vampire even tells the man, named Caleb, in the story, that he is a mate, not a partner, because Katrina (main character) is better than he is in every way. It was really just hammered home about how small and insignificant Caleb is, and that didn’t make for interesting reading.

Despite that major complaint, it was a very good story that I enjoyed. When the focus was on Katrina and Caleb, and not how weak he is, it was real solid.

Strengths:

• The vampires in the story are all very interesting.
• Refreshing change of pace with characters and their roles.
• The romance plot, when not ridiculing Caleb, is well done.

Weaknesses:

• The relationship between Caleb and Katrina is very one-sided. He is weak, both in spirit and will, and this point is repeated throughout. I kept waiting for the “turning point”, where Caleb would come into his own, but this doesn’t really happen in my opinion.

Warning: Slight Language and Violence (It is a zombie novel after all  🙂 )

As she jogged by a backyard with no gate, a corpse that had been behind an old shed lunged at her. They both fell to the hard ground. She tried to stab it in the skull, but was disoriented by a hard pull at her feet. She looked down to see another corpse making its way up her legs. It would only be a matter of seconds before it found a soft spot to sink its teeth into. She kicked with her legs while trying to push the one on her chest away. Its jaws snapped dangerously close to her face. She could see three more walking slowly toward her. She felt the strength in her arms giving away, while her sweatpants were pulled down, revealing her thigh to the other corpse.

She saw a shadow move above her that was too fast to be a corpse. She heard a violent crack, and the tugging at her legs stopped. The shadow stopped above her, and she screamed as the head of an arrow pierced the skull of the corpse on top of her, stopping just an inch short of her nose.

She rolled the corpse off to the side and looked up to see a figure standing above her. Her first instinct was that it couldn’t be a man. She was the only human in the city. The sun was behind him, so she couldn’t see his face. It was only when he felt for her arm and pulled her up with a warm, strong grip that she knew he was human.

The man had a large compound bow and a quiver on his back. He quickly shot the three oncoming corpses in the brain with ease. Samantha was impressed.

She could see him now. He was definitely a man, maybe around the same age as her. He was completely bald with bright blue eyes, and just slightly taller than she was. He wore old blue jeans and a white tank top, revealing a lean upper body. She thought he looked ridiculous, totally without protection.

He did something that caught Samantha by surprise. He smiled. Then he said something even stranger.

“Good afternoon.”

Her mouth hung open. Her instincts told her something was very different about him. “This city is full of walkers,” she blurted.

“Walkers? The walking corpses? Well, yeah. You just notice that now?”

There was a loud crash not far away. They both looked to see walkers pouring out of the house Samantha ran through. They were at both ends of the alley too.

“Wow. Looks like you really got them riled up,” he said calmly.

Samantha looked at him. The brief hope she felt when he pulled her to her feet was gone. Physically, he seemed fine, but something wasn’t right in his head. They were surrounded by death, and he didn’t seem bothered in the least.

He’s insane. Out of his mind.

She’d seen it before at Lexington. The world wasn’t easy, and some people just couldn’t handle it. Everyone lived in a world ruled by monsters. It was easy for a mind to snap.

She turned to run. He caught her by the arm, and she quickly pulled free.

“Whoa. Where you going?”

“Somewhere safe, where there aren’t any walkers. And don’t touch me.”

He laughed, again putting Samantha on edge. “Good luck with that. Listen, see that backyard there, with the grill on its side? Run through that house to the next street. Look for the house with The End Is Near spray-painted above the door.”

“I can’t read.”

He gave her a look. “Can’t read? Well, can you count?”

“Yeah, I can count, asshole.”

He smirked. “Fourth house down from the end. You should see it as soon as you hit the street. I’ll meet you there.”

“What are you gonna do?”

“I’ll slow them down.”

Samantha turned and ran. She knew she owed the stranger her life, but she wasn’t going to wait around for him.

He wants to be an idiot and get himself killed, fine by me.

I have to give a special beastly “You are the man” to Nathan Lowell on the Kindleboards forum for helping me tweak the cover of Demonspawn.

Covers are the first thing people will see about your book. I wish I was more artistic when it came to designing them. There are just so many little details I never thought of when it came to putting one together. For an eBook, obviously you need to see the author and title. The thing I forgot when making my first cover was that it needed to be clear when shrinking down to thumbnail size.

I’m having a tough time with the cover for my next novel. You would think there would be more nice images of zombies to use all over stock websites, but I can’t find anything that really grabs my imagination.

I wonder for the more successful authors how much their cover art ties directly into their sales.

I figure I’m about two weeks away from finishing my zombie novel. Of course, I’ll proofread it a bunch, and hopefully get another set of eyes on it. Then I need a cover and title. Plenty of work left. Still, it’s always fun to review the road to this point.

I restarted this one I think three times. I was mostly done once, then I realized I got the setting completely wrong. My wife told me to finish it anyway, but I just couldn’t fix the setting error.

My zombie novel takes place twenty years in the future after the dead first begin to walk. I thought this would be an interesting setting, as most zombie stuff I read takes place near “Day One”. I liked the challenge of moving it into the future, as not only are the zombies a constant threat, but so is day to day survival. There is no electricity, no running water, no grocery store.

On my one great “nearly done” attempt, the main setting was a baseball stadium. I was thinking Baltimore’s Camden Yards when I was writing it. For anyone familiar with Camden Yards, the entire stadium has a fence surrounding the thing, perfect for keeping those zombies at bay 🙂 But after I went to a game one year, I realized Camden Yards didn’t exactly offer the “oh wow it’s tough to survive” feel I was going for. If I have to sleep in Camden Yards when the zombies come, I’ll survive. The place has plenty of closed in spaces to sleep, protection from the elements, etc. After I saw this, I pretty much had to start over, as I just couldn’t use that setting. I moved the main setting to an old high school, and it’s worked out much better.

I think my main female character, Samantha (Sam for short), is probably the best female character I’ve ever created. Sam is a product of a life growing up alone, constantly trying to survive while avoiding beating eaten. She is tough, with a “me first” attitude, and she never once falls into the “damsel in distress” category. Nearing the end of the novel, I’m pleasantly surprised with how she turned out.

The final hook of the story, which hopefully most people will like, is the unique abilities of the main character Aaron. I always have to have someone odd or special in my novels, and Aaron is no different. Through reasons that you’ll have to read to see (haha), Aaron can move with the zombies with no difficulty. They don’t attack him at all, like other humans. This gives Aaron a different outlook, as he hasn’t had the same experiences of survival that other people have been forced to go through.

I’m still working on that cover and title, but I think fans of zombie fiction will enjoy the ride. I actually have the first few chapters online, although they’ve been edited since then. If you want to get a feel, check it out.