Book Birthday Review: A Flood of Posies by Tiffany Meuret

5/5 Stars 255 pages
Published February 9th 2021 by Black Spot Books

I have to say before anything else, that this book was so intricate and amazing, and I really didn’t expect it. I definitely thought it would be a good one, a wild ride, but I really just didn’t know what exactly I was getting myself into when I started it. And I’m so thankful I got the chance to read it. This haunting book is something I feel like I will think about for a solid amount of time now that I’ve finished it. It’s horrific and fantastic, but in none of the usual ways. And I’ll explain why.

Following a pair of sisters in 2025 and also in 2026, one ten years older named Doris, and Thea, who jokingly says she was almost named the accident. Their lives are drastically different. Both traumatized by their abusive mother, someone who was obsessed with the image that she presented to the people around her, but not really caring what it took to get to that perfect image, including violence against the two. This lead them to live completely different lives, Doris living with her husband and suffering for her independence after a debilitating car accident, and Thea, an addict living anywhere she can. Everything changes however, when the flood comes. And with it brings the Posies.

Photo by Kristina Nor on Pexels.com

The story rotates between two chapters of before, and two after the flood. It shows both sisters lives, and through these chapters we really get to know each character very intimately and deeply. Easily these two and their mother could be very real people, and there’s no problem believing that. Mixed into that is this fantastically scary world filled with water and death and basically just Thea, or better known as Sestra after the flood, doing what she has to, to survive. This book does an amazing job of describing exactly what it would be like to have to live in the middle of an ocean with no land in sight, and especially no food or water. Starving and dying of thirst, Sestra finds herself on a boat with a man she doesn’t know named Rob, as the two struggle to survive. That’s just the beginning though. Because the Posies are always underneath the surface, just waiting for something to come by. Massive octopus like creatures, they can easily take boats down and crush whatever they can grab a hold of with their tentacles.

Photo by Maria Orlova on Pexels.com

I had a really good time reading this book. As horrific as some of the chapters were, and they really made me scared for them sometimes, I think it did it’s job, and it did it well. This is what I want from a book like this. And I can guarantee that it’ll be something you’re thinking about for a long time after you’ve set it back on your shelf. I think it’s even something I could read again and again, and I very rarely say that. I’d love to have a copy for my own shelf. The breathtaking cover reveals little about what is actually inside the book, and I just really love everything about it. Definitely check it out if you get the chance.

If you’d like to grab a copy, you can do so here through my Amazon Associates link.

And if you’d like to keep up with the author, you can here on Twitter!

Thanks for reading! Hope you’re doing well and staying safe.

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Babylon Twins by MF Gibson Review

Babylon Twins is a hilariously strange book following a set of twins named El and Clo, who have lived in the forest of an apocalyptic future earth for the past ten years, with their mother and little brother. The story is told through the views of both twins at the same time. El and Clo also have their own secret twin language that they speak throughout most of the story.

 

I have to say, that the cover and description of the book really doesn’t tell you too much about what’s really inside of it. Though the book is really, and I don’t say this lightly, weird, it’s so weird that it just makes me kind of love it. The twins go through their daily life until one day their mother just leaves, leaving them alone without really telling them why. This drives them to try to survive in the forest themselves, until things other than robots begin attacking them. This is when they leave the forest and venture out into the cities around them.

 

This launches the characters into an adventure that almost reminds me of a fever dream, now that I’ve finished it I keep thinking about it like, did that really happen? Full of robots and tentacle monsters and crazy people in general, this book isn’t something I’ll forget about anytime soon. It’s hilarious and kind of cute, and super descriptive in all the right ways. Before the end of the world, the twins were eight years old and fighting kids at school. Now, as eighteen year olds, they have to figure out their live all alone, as almost insane things happen around them, and they’re just trying to figure out what kind of women they need to be.

 

The book is available here.

Thanks for reading!

Crowded, Vol. 1 by Christopher Sebela, Ro Stein, & Ted Brandt Review

Crowded, Vol. 1 by Christopher Sebela, Ro Stein, & Ted Brandt 5/5 Stars 160 pages
Publishing date: March 26th 2019 by Image Comics 

“Crowded” is another graphic novel with a girl who has hair like me, and I’ll never get tired of seeing it. Charlie is known better as “The Million Dollar Girl”, and then later as “The Two Million Dollar Girl”. One of the highest ranking paid assassinations on the app Reapr, which allows people to crowdfund enough money in the hopes that someone will kill her for that money. In the first issue, we see her meeting up with Vita, a female body guard, in a restaurant.

 

Vita’s kind of an uptight type, who goes to bed early, and only works when she feels like she’s prepared. She says that she didn’t say she could sit with her at the table, but Charlie tells her that she’s paying her, and that she should relax. If that doesn’t set the tone of their entire relationship throughout the book, I don’t know what does. Moments later, a man pulls out a gun in attempt to shoot Charlie, but Vita shoots him without even pausing. Charlie tells Vita why they’re there.

 

It started out like any other normal day, Charlie, working her many jobs through apps and just doing her thing. She likes to rent out things she owns for money, like her car and her clothes, but she also does other things for money, like walking dogs and babysitting, and even tutoring calculus. My favourite though, is when an old man books her to hang out and feed the pigeons with him. Who wouldn’t want that job? She hooks up with strangers and sneaks out before they wake up, but that day everything changed. Someone started shooting at her from across the street. And they’re only in it for the money.

 

This book is one that’s exciting from the first few pages. I really enjoyed the colourful art and the story itself, it’s not like anything I’ve read lately. My favourite character of course is Charlie, but also Vita, because they’re so different from each other that really work well together. Of course, how could I not like the girl with hair like me? The story is full of gunfights, explosions, and Vita chasing after Charlie. She often wonders if she wants to get killed, but I think that Charlie just wants to live her life while she still can, especially when there’s a hit taken out on her. I also really liked the different art styles in the variant covers, and between issues. I really liked reading this, and I’m glad I got the chance to check it out. If you think it’s something you would like, I definitely recommend you check it out too.

 

The book is available here, and here’s a link to the creator’s Twitter accounts, if you’d like to keep up with them.

https://twitter.com/xtop

https://twitter.com/RosyTintedSpecs?lang=en

https://twitter.com/ten_bandits?lang=en

Thanks for reading!

Tooth and Talon by Alex Hernandez Review

Tooth and Talon by Alex Hernandez 3/5 Stars 308 pages
Published July 17th 2017 by EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing

In a world full of genetically modified humans and space ships, fifty eight year old Oya is going to live forever. Or, maybe not. Earth is almost abandoned, and our solar system is just the tip of the iceberg in this new world. Mars is inhabited by Raptors, more commonly referred to as Harpies; people that have altered themselves to have wings and talons.

 

The beginning of the book shows Oya visiting her one hundred and eighty five year old grandmother on her little island, still living on Earth. Everyone around her has evacuated, but she refuses to give up home that she can return it to it’s former glory. Oya is worried about her, but she seems fine for the most part. Her grandmother turns out to be probably my favourite character in the book, because she just believes in herself and the world so much that she’s almost able to will what she wants into existence, and I want to be like that.

 

The story itself is exciting, but a little hard to follow. For some reason I felt like I was missing something, like another book beforehand that more thoroughly explained terms, and appearances of things in the story. The third person viewpoint doesn’t bother me, and it’s jumps right into the action, but I get a little lost trying to follow the actual story. I just can’t imagine what’s happening with the characters because I can’t imagine them in general, and there’s a lot of words that I don’t know, that aren’t explained. Overall, though I did enjoy the story and think it was really unique and interesting. I think it has the potential to have a lot of fans.

 

If you’re looking for something futuristic and somewhat alien, than this is the book for you. It’s available here, and here’s a link to the author’s Twitter, if you’d like to keep up with them.

Thanks for reading!

Killing Adam by Earik Beann Review

Killing Adam by Earik Beann 5/5 Stars 224 pages
Published January 1st 2019 by Profoundly One Publishing

The biggest change to human technology was an accident. It began with four patients strapped to tables, and it ended with a completely new person. That person was Adam, first of his kind, and he changed everything. Gone were the days of dangerous streets and traffic accidents, once an AI took over, of course. The implants changed everything, but what no one thought of was what about the people who couldn’t get them?

 

When you think of a dystopian novel, you usually think of the technology, the housing situation, and how people’s lives are changed by it, right? This book brings up a whole new subject that I never even thought of, and that is that not everyone is fit to get an electronic implant. Following Jimmy Mahoney, a man who is stuck on disability because he can’t operate in and with the city around him.

 

The book begins with Jimmy going to an Implant Disability Anonymous meeting, the only form of a social life that he gets to have. Unlike a lot of the other members, Jimmy has the most basic type of implant, because his brain can send but can’t receive the signals from the implant itself. He can open doors and take the bus as well as use the elevator, but aside from basic text chat, that’s all he can do, and is classified as disabled. He doesn’t feel disabled, but because of the world around him relying so heavily on technology, he’s helpless.

 

Today is different than other days, because there’s a new girl. Her name is Trixie, and she’s only interested in Jimmy. He feels uncomfortable being around her because he has a wife, though their relationship is stressed because she chooses to be offline only when her implant forces her to be. But he soon finds out that she’s not interested in him that way. She’s part of a group that can give him a different kind of implant, and hack it’s way online. He wants a normal life, and he wants his relationship with his wife back, but is he willing to take the risk?

 

I loved reading this book. The characters were really interesting, and even though I couldn’t tell you what they looked like, I felt really connected to them. The story is told in third person. Sometimes you can feel pulled away from the story if you’re not used to reading in this viewpoint, especially when things are moving quickly and the characters are switching around, but I didn’t have that problem with this book.

 

If I had to choose a favourite character, I would probably choose Trixie because she’s the most interesting out of all of them. Not only does she go through major heartache, but she’s able to bounce back in the best way and make everything better. Overall, I really enjoyed reading this book, and if you like futuristic technology and Artificial Intelligence mixed into a dystopian world, then this is the book for you.

 

The book is available here, and here’s a link to the author’s Twitter.

Thanks for reading!

What will books be like in 100 years?

I like to think about this topic a lot, mainly because the way that we read has changed so much in the last, even just fifty years. Ebooks have become a mainstream, easy way to read on the go, without having to worry about what’s going to happen to your paper copies, and having to carry them around if you want to read more than one book at once.

I, for one, love all kinds of books and enjoy the accessibility of ebooks, but there’s nothing like reading a paper copy. I find that I have an easier time just reading a paper book, and things go a lot faster if I have one. that being said, I love that a lot of ebook readers track your reading now, because I think its really cool that I can see almost exactly when I’ll finish it. Also that you can have access to a dictionary at any time by just holding your finger on a word that you don’t know.

In the future, I think that because of the environmental crisis that the world is facing, we will replace paper copies with maybe another material to print on, or mostly use ebooks. I would hate to see physical copies be eradicated completely, and I’m sure a lot of other people would too, including libraries. I really just can’t wait to see what will happen in the future, and I hope that we can save the planet in the meantime.

Any thoughts you’d like to share about this topic? Let me know in the comments!

It’s just food for thought, thanks for reading.