A Tree, A Book, and A Breeze

The Massacre of Mankind Stephen Baxter Crown A sequel to the H.G. Wells classic THE WAR OF THE WORLDS, brilliantly realized by award-winning SF author and Wells expert Stephen Baxter It has been 14 years since the Martians invaded England. The world has moved on, always watching the skies but content that we know how to defeat the Martian menace. Machinery looted from the abandoned capsules and war-machines has led to technological leaps forward. The Martians are vulnerable to earth germs. The Army is prepared. So when the signs of launches on Mars are seen, there seems little reason to worry. Unless you listen to one man, Walter Jenkins, the narrator of Wells' book. He is sure that the Martians have learned, adapted, understood their defeat. He is right. Thrust into the chaos of a new invasion, a journalist - sister-in-law to Walter Jenkins - must survive, escape and report on the war. The Massacre of Mankind has begun.      I'm always a litt

The Space Between Words Michèle Phoenix  Thomas Nelson "There were seconds, when I woke, when the world felt unshrouded. Then memory returned." When Jessica regains consciousness in a French hospital on the day after the Paris attacks, all she can think of is fleeing the site of the horror she survived. But Patrick, the steadfast friend who hasn't left her side, urges her to reconsider her decision. Worn down by his insistence, she reluctantly agrees to follow through with the trip they'd planned before the tragedy. "The pages found you," Patrick whispered. "Now you need to figure out what they're trying to say." During a stop at a country flea market, Jessica finds a faded document concealed in an antique. As new friends help her to translate the archaic French, they uncover the story of Adeline Baillard, a young woman who lived centuries before--her faith condemned, her life endangered, her community decimated by

Cloaked Rachel Kovaciny She never imagined she'd need to flee for her life. Mary Rose feels uneasy around Mr. Linden from the moment she meets him on the stagecoach ride to her grandmother's ranch in Wyoming Territory. But he works for her grandmother, so that means he's trustworthy, doesn't it? Everyone else seems to view him as honest and respectable, and Mary Rose wonders if she's overreacting.  She tries to ignore her suspicions until one night, she discovers his real reason for being at the ranch. Now, if she's going to save her grandmother -- and herself -- she's going to need to run faster than she's ever run before.      I will almost never pass up an opportunity for a fairy tale retelling. It's one of my favorite subgenres, and I haven't gotten tired of it yet. Now westerns, on the other hand, aren't usually my thing, but after reading Rachel Kovaciny's The Man of the Buckskin Horse , I knew that she was someo

An Inconvenient Beauty Kristi Ann Hunter Bethany House Publishers       I began reading Kristi Ann Hunter's Hawthorne House series when the first book came out, and I enjoyed it- I do like a good historical novel set in the Regency period, and while this series isn't written in true "Regency" style, it's lighthearted and fun, as well as often comedic.      However, the previous book in the series left me a little disappointed, and I'm afraid the same happened with An Inconvenient Beauty as well. I wasn't sure why the novel wasn't clicking with me, but by the end I think I had it narrowed down to that fact that the writing is a bit too repetitive and over-explanatory; it dragged the plot and the humor down.      There were some things I liked about the book, though: Isabella is a character who in any other romance novel might have been seen as the villain,  as she's beautiful and encourages multiple suitors that she never has any int

The Mountain Between Us Charles Martin Broadway Books      I feel like I should preface this review by admitting that this novel isn't in a genre I normally read or am drawn to; contemporary fiction has never held much appeal to me. However, I saw the trailer for the movie version that's coming out soon, and thought it looked interesting (I mean, it's a survival story, right?). When I realized that the film was based on a book, and that that book was available for review, I thought I should try it- especially when I recognized the author's name. (I hadn't read anything by him before, but I've seen his books in CBD's catalogs).      However, within the first few chapters I knew that this book wasn't going to win me over. The dialogue seemed sentimentally unrealistic to me, and to be brutally honest, I found it boring and a struggle to drag myself through. Technically, this book isn't exactly a DNF for me, since I read the last five or so