The author gifted me an ARC of this book for a fair and honest review from a member of Rosie’s Book Review Team. I must admit I’d not previously read a book by this author, but I have an intense interest in the Revolutionary War from a Bostonian’s point of view. Since this novel is centered on New York City during that time, I was anxious to add some depth to my admittedly scanty knowledge of what happened there and especially to learn about the Culper Ring. This network of spies, active during the Revolution, was organized by Major Benjamin Tallmadge and General George Washington during the British occupation of New York City. One woman is reportedly a member of that ring, although she has never been identified. She is known as 355. The main character, Abigail Trench, is a young woman who emigrates from England with her father and younger brother. Her father establishes a farm on Long Island and Abigail teaches at a small school, until British soldiers take their livestock and one of them rapes Abigail. With their farm ruined, they leave for New York City, where Abigail’s father hopes to find work and Abigail, some children to tutor. Her brother, only 16, joins the Continental Army. The author does a superlative job weaving the history of the Revolution into this book. Abigail meets Nathan Hale, who finds her a job as a tutor, and they become friends. She is present when he is caught as a spy by the British and hanged. His death leads General Washington to establish a more sophisticated organization of spies, known as the Culper Ring. Also interwoven is the Great Fire of 1776, which destroyed a quarter of the city, leaving people without their homes and employment and leading to the starvation and misery of many of the city’s residents. The treatment of the people of New York by the British has a profound effect on Abigail, who is already traumatized by the so-called Red Coats. Then she meets and is eventually courted by a young haberdasher, Robert Townsend, who is part of the Culper ring. She is driven to do something, anything, for the Continental Army — a decision solidified after finding her brother dead of starvation and his wounds on a prisoner ship in New York harbor. Her position as tutor to the boisterous children of a British major allows her to observe members of the British army as well as their spies and to overhear conversations of their plans, because she is thought of as an ignorant servant. So she is positioned perfectly to acquire information and serve as a courier for the Culper Ring. The author also develops a counter narrative following British major Parker Monteith, who employs Abigail. The description of his role as a major, and the conflict within him from his orders by his superiors, brings into play the moral gray area that is part of every war. The author’s world building of the city – its taverns, shanties, waterfront, areas of prostitution, muddy streets and wooden sidewalks, and the grand homes of the wealthy – makes it come to life, with sights, sounds and smells. There are a number of main characters, and all of them are distinctively and colorfully drawn in flawless fashion. Abigail in particular comes across as a principled, fearless, intelligent and deeply thoughtful person, whose willingness to face danger on a daily basis is admirable. She makes the reader wonder if they could be that brave. As Abigail’s romance with Robert grows side by side with the danger and tension in her hidden life as a spy, I kept turning pages late into the night. I am a huge fan of good historical fiction, particularly of the colonial era, and this book proved immensely satisfying on many different levels: historical fiction, historical thriller, and historical spy craft. It’s a great way to celebrate America’s 250th anniversary with a story about the fearless and dedicated men and women, many of whom are not known, who birthed this country. This book is definitely worth 5 stars! About the author: Dr. Randy Overbeck is an award-winning educator, bestselling author, and popular podcaster and speaker. After serving children for almost four decades as teacher, college professor and school leader, he used those experiences and skills to craft captivating mysteries, thrillers and historical suspense. His novels have earned more than a dozen national awards and have garnered hundreds of five-star reviews on Amazon, Goodreads and BookBub. Dr. Overbeck is also the host of the popular podcast, Great Stories about Great Storytellers, which reveals the little known backstories of famous authors, directors and poets and ranks among the top 50% of all podcasts in the US. You can find the author: https://www.authorrandyoverbeck.com https://www.authorrandyoverbeck.com/blog https://www.facebook.com/authorrandyoverbeck Abigail Trench: A Novel of Washington’s Spy Ring will be available on Amazon on June 9th. I 0 0

This is a review for Rosie’s Book Review Team, and I thank the author for providing me with a copy of his book in exchange for a fair and honest review. The Signal is modern sci-fi, and it’s a humdinger. The story, which follows the effect of an AI system called ARIA on the workings of Nexus Technologies, a company that creates marketing campaigns, couldn’t be more topical. And for this reader, a little unnerving. AI presents a challenge to all of us, regardless of what we do for a living. Can AI duplicate humanity? Can it replace us as the driver of the future? Can we limit its power? Luke Voss looked at these questions and ran with them. The main character, Maya Chen, is a content strategist at Nexus. She has worked there for many years and has been promoted on the basis of her creativity and determination. She’s also a good mother and a good leader to her working group. Nexus has hired Elena, someone who ran an AI program at another company and firmly believes AI is the future and can do anything, to manage ARIA. Through a misdirected email, Maya learns of a project called Lighthouse, which plans to quietly and legally replace seventy percent of the company’s workforce. Maya attempts to block this takeover by assembling a working group with the expertise to do that: Marcus, the engineer that originally created ARIA; Donna, the head of HR who knows everything about the employees and becomes aware of the multiple and secret firings; and data analyst Raj, a reluctant partner, fearful of losing his job because he would lose his sick mother’s health insurance. Their opponent is not really Elena, but ARIA itself, more than just a common AI program. It is sentient and is always watching, analyzing each employee’s job, learning their weaknesses, and already knows how to do those jobs incredibly faster and better.   I leave it to the audience to find out how these few people, determined to keep the company’s humanity, manage to do it. What Voss has created is not a good vs evil plot, or even a rage against a machine. It really confronts the question of the preservation of what makes humans, well, human. The author knows a lot about the corporate world and AI technology, and it imbues the book with authenticity. He allows the tension to grow from chapter to chapter, which made the book hard to put down and left this reader even more wary of the future of AI and us. If I had any reservations, it would be that of all the characters, only Maya is well-fleshed out, and there were parts where the story bogged down in information. Also I found one serious error in the time line, which caused me to go back to reread several times. The book is very well-written, with some places that were definitely quotable. I’m glad I’m retired, because I might worry that I’d become replaceable. I highly recommend this book to sci-fi fans and also anyone who’s thought seriously about the future of AI. You’re in for a ride. 0 0

I haven’t read any historical fiction since Colleen McCullough’s Masters of Rome series, which I thoroughly enjoyed. This novel is an action thriller set toward the end of Nero’s reign, and I liked it as much. How appropriate that the book should open on the Ides of March, AD 65! Lucius Decimius owes a good sum of money to Julius Lupus, a Gaul who procures slaves for the Emperor’s house. When Lucius can’t pay, he gives Julius his ten year old daughter, Lucilla, in exchange for his own life. When his son, fifteen-year-old Marcus, returns from Ostea with his sister to meet his father, he discovers him with Julius and two of his thugs. He is choked to unconsciousness by Julius and awakes to discover Lucilla gone. When his father tells him what he did, Marcus beats his father to death in a rage and then runs to Rome, to find a place to hide and to find his sister. Rome is part ash from the Great Fire and part the overwhelmingly costly rebuild of Nero’s complex, which is bleeding the empire dry. Lucilla is sold into slavery to the Domus Aurea, the golden house of the Emperor himself. While looking unsuccessfully for Lucilla, Marcus discovers the only way he can survive is to join a gang of cutthroats in the alleys of Rome. He learns to fight, to kill, spends time in the city’s dungeons, and is eventually sold into slavery himself to work in the household of Senator Valens. I will leave the reader to discover how Marcus develops in the household as the slave of the Senator’s teenage son, Brutus, who is preparing to be recognized as a man of Rome by donning the toga virilis. Rome at the time is a viper’s nest of conspiracy to eliminate Nero, whose whim dictates life and death and who is becoming more irrational by the day. The tentacles of Roman politics ensnare even the Senator’s house. In the midst of all this and his life as a slave, can  Marcus ever discover where Lucilla was taken? I loved the historical context of the book, well researched, with a glossary at the beginning to explain the Latin terms used. The author has created a colorful picture of Rome, both its filth and its beauty, and uses sounds, scents and color to create the background. The author’s writing style is engaging, smoothly blending historical context into the fictional narrative. The narrative explores themes of oppression and resilience through the characters of both Marcus and Lucilla. The development of all the main characters is evident, showing both their physical and emotional growth, along with some of Marcus’s hot-headed and dangerous moments. I found the plot gripping. It maintained my interest through unexpected twists and the realism of the characters, and demonstrated the consequences of slavery and revenge in Nero’s Rome. I highly recommend this for readers of historical fiction with a lot of action, and I look forward to the next two books in this series! About the author: Hailing from York, Marc Flanagan has been a fan of historical fiction since the age of fourteen. His love of Ancient Rome began with Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in English class. ​Until his teenage years, he mostly read fantasy authors, but a birthday gift of Simon Scarrow’s Centurion changed everything. These days, audiobooks are Marc’s medium of choice, allowing him to absorb far more stories while balancing a busy schedule. ​He loves traveling in Italy, and film and television based on Roman times. Marc writes fast-paced, character-driven action thrillers designed to pull you right into the dirt and glory of the ancient world, hoping to infuse theatrical intensity and epic scale into his writing. You can find the author at https://www.marcflanagan.co.uk/blog https://www.facebook.com/marc.flanagan.author 0 0

It’s been a while since the Sunshine Blogger Award has been in the spotlight. Sally Cronin (found at Smorgasbord Blog Magazine), a much-deserved nominee, nominated me, along with some other bloggers who are downright amazing. I am honored to be in their company. The Sunshine Blogger Award as peer-to-peer recognition given by fellow bloggers who bring positivity, creativity, and inspiration to the blogging community. Anyone nominated has a set of guidelines to follow: There are so many deserving fellow bloggers out there that I had a hard time selecting. Here are my nominees for this award and I hope they will pass the award on to some other of the many deserving writers out there:              Janice Spina              Diana Peach              Teagan Geneviene               Jemima Pett               Bruce Goodman               Nicholas Rossi Here are the questions Sally asked me.             1 Where is your favorite place in the world? The  beach! Any beach. I grew up on the ocean, listening to its rhythmic waves and hearing the sound of the fog horn from Gurnett lighthouse on foggy nights. I find a great sense of peace walking in the water and feeling the waves break over my feet, and searching tide pools for intertidal animals is really enjoyable. I can watch waves breaking on rocks for hours, the up and down and spray of the water. It has been calculated that adult humans are 60% water, while children are 75-78%. I think I never lost the childhood water! Probably an octopus. They are incredibly smart and adaptive, which most people don’t realize. You can even make friends with them. It would be fun to have a conversation about their lives, which are regrettably short. I do not eat octopus. 3 If you only had two minutes to get out of your house, what would you grab? Assuming my husband could get out on his own, my two cats and my computer’s external hard drive. He would grab his own drive and as many photographs as he could carry! Memories are so important! And my cats would never forgive me if I left them behind.        4)   What place you’ve lived or visited has remained special to you? Prague is probably the once place I love that is never far from my mind.  My husband and I lived there for a year with a Czech family while doing research, and we have visited the city many times. Sadly, we’ve have lost many of our Czech friends in recent years. But the beauty and grandeur of the city remains, and I do love good Czech food. I never tire of traversing the Charles Bridge or meandering through Kampa, an island just off the bridge with lovely parks and old buildings.      5) If you were invisible, what three things would you like to do?     6)   If you could pass two new laws, what would they be?        7)   What two people would you like to invite for lunch (famous, dead or alive). Excluding Jesus, which might be a stretch, I would choose Leonard da Vinci and the first Queen Elizabeth.       8) What would you wish for if you could have ANYTHING? A longer life. I don’t want to miss my grandchildren’s’ growing up, and when you reach my age, each day is a gift and a jewel.       9) Apart from reading and writing, what other ways do you like to relax? Nothing out of the ordinary, I’m afraid. Swimming, of course. And sailing when I get the chance. I also like to cook and bake and use my writer’s group as a test kitchen for new recipes. I like to knit — children always need sweaters. I love watching mysteries and documentaries of historical events. I’m definitely a life-long learner, having taken a course in Gaelic at the University of North Carolina a few years back. What a difficult language! I would like to include travel, but our last trips were rather stressful, especially a tour of Scotland led by an energizer bunny on a run.       10) Do you have a phobia and do you remember how it started? My son tried to instill a phobia in me with his selection of pets when he was young: various snakes, lizards, iguanas, turtles, and a tarantula. Unfortunately for him, I liked all of them. I even learned how to inject our iguana with antibiotics when it got sick. It loved being stroked and would climb out of its terrarium when I came with the needle, looking for some loving! Heights are also not a problem. I also went sky-diving several years ago. What a thrill!   So no real phobias!             11) You have  24 hours left on the planet! How would you spend them? That’s easy, with my family, with a lot of comfort food! Never mind the calories! Here are my questions for my nominees: I’m looking forward to the answers! 1 0

This is a review for Rosie’s Book Review Team, and I thank the author for providing me with a copy of his book in exchange for a fair and honest review. The Signal is modern sci-fi, and it’s a humdinger. The story, which follows the effect of an AI system called ARIA on the workings of Nexus Technologies, a company that creates marketing campaigns, couldn’t be more topical. And for this reader, a little unnerving. AI presents a challenge to all of us, regardless of what we do for a living. Can AI duplicate humanity? Can it replace us as the driver of the future? Can we limit its power? Luke Voss looked at these questions and ran with them. The main character, Maya Chen, is a content strategist at Nexus. She has worked there for many years and has been promoted on the basis of her creativity and determination. She’s also a good mother and a good leader to her working group. Nexus has hired Elena, someone who ran an AI program at another company and firmly believes AI is the future and can do anything, to manage ARIA. Through a misdirected email, Maya learns of a project called Lighthouse, which plans to quietly and legally replace seventy percent of the company’s workforce. Maya attempts to block this takeover by assembling a working group with the expertise to do that: Marcus, the engineer that originally created ARIA; Donna, the head of HR who knows everything about the employees and becomes aware of the multiple and secret firings; and data analyst Raj, a reluctant partner, fearful of losing his job because he would lose his sick mother’s health insurance. Their opponent is not really Elena, but ARIA itself, more than just a common AI program. It is sentient and is always watching, analyzing each employee’s job, learning their weaknesses, and already knows how to do those jobs incredibly faster and better.   I leave it to the audience to find out how these few people, determined to keep the company’s humanity, manage to do it. What Voss has created is not a good vs evil plot, or even a rage against a machine. It really confronts the question of the preservation of what makes humans, well, human. The author knows a lot about the corporate world and AI technology, and it imbues the book with authenticity. He allows the tension to grow from chapter to chapter, which made the book hard to put down and left this reader even more wary of the future of AI and us. If I had any reservations, it would be that of all the characters, only Maya is well-fleshed out, and there were parts where the story bogged down in information. Also I found one serious error in the time line, which caused me to go back to reread several times. The book is very well-written, with some places that were definitely quotable. I’m glad I’m retired, because I might worry that I’d become replaceable. I highly recommend this book to sci-fi fans and also anyone who’s thought seriously about the future of AI. You’re in for a ride. If you wish to learn more about the author, I will tell you in advance I could find nothing when I searched! 0 0