Author name: Sayling@@Away

Calling all fans of fantasy and D. Wallace Peach: Diana has a new book just out! It’s entitled Tale of the Seasons’ Weaver, and it more than lives up to Diana’s high standard of compelling stories, complete with a beautiful cover. Here is the blurb for Tale of the Seasons’ Weaver: “Already the animals starve. Soon the bonemen will follow, the Moss Folk and woodlings, the watermaids and humans. Then the charmed will fade. And all who will roam a dead world are dead things. Until they too vanish for lack of remembering. Still, Weaver, it is not too late.” In the frost-kissed cottage where the changing seasons are spun, Erith wears the Weaver’s mantle, a title that tests her mortal, halfling magic.  As the equinox looms, her first tapestry nears completion—a breathtaking ode to spring. She journeys to the charmed isle of Innishold to release the beauty of nature’s awakening across the land. But human hunters have defiled the enchanted forest and slaughtered winter’s white wolves. Enraged by the trespass, the Winter King seizes Erith’s tapestry and locks her within his ice-bound palace. Here, where comfort and warmth are mere glamours, she may weave only winter until every mortal village succumbs to starvation, ice, and the gray wraiths haunting the snow.  With humanity’s fate on a perilous edge, Erith must break free of the king’s grasp and unravel a legacy of secrets. In a charmed court where illusions hold sway, allies matter, foremost among them, the Autumn Prince. Immortal and beguiling, he offers a tantalizing future she has only imagined, one she will never possess—unless she claims her extraordinary power to weave life from the brink of death. My review: The tale opens with an unanticipated confrontation of mortals with enchanted beings, the Winter King’s white wolves. A bloody and terrible battle ensues in which places the delicate balance between the enchanted and mortal worlds on a razor’s edge. This prologue left me breathless and wondering what would come next. Then, in a cottage that spans the boundary between the enchanted and mortal world, the reader is introduced to a halfling named Erith. Her mother, a magical being, was the much revered weaver of tapestries for each season, which ensured the seasonal changes. Now, taking over from her mother, Erith must assume the demanding task of creating the tapestries, her first being that of spring, which at the spring equinox will be imbued with an enchantment causing the change from winter to spring. It is an age old honor to be the Season’s Weaver and a heavy burden, especially when the four seasons are not always gracious about handing over the crown at the appropriate time. Erith has to remain impartial to not cause any further disharmony; to the extent she herself only wears black or grey to avoid showing a preference. While Erith feels herself to be an inadequate weaver in comparison to her mother’s, she nevertheless completes the beautiful weaving and now must bring it to the magical island of Innishold. There the Winter King resides, and there winter will give way to spring with the enchantment of the weaving at the equinox.   The author’s imagination has no limits in her inventions of characters, and I am more often than not gobsmacked by her creations. In the first chapter the reader is introduced to Mazheven, leader of the Mori Duglum, stout hunters clad in green cloaks with carrying powerful bows on their backs and quivers of arrows at their hips. Mazheven wears a long red scarf that encircles his neck, which contrasts with his cloak and his white beard. This guide taught Erith lessons in woodlore and with his band will see her safely through the snowy and foggy forest and across the frozen lake to the Winter King’s palace, a journey fraught with danger. One of those dangers are the wylyali , which Erith sees lurking the forest. These are fearsome. horned winter predators that slip from the “gauzy border” that separates the living from the dead. They hunt anything mortal with a blood lust, and the more they eat, the more hungry they become. Tall and gaunt, their pale skin is stretched so tightly over their bodies that their individual muscles and bones can be seen. They are truly frightening. After crossing the frozen lake and finding the Winter King and the rest of the seasonal royalty already in a wild celebration of the equinox, Erith is engulfed in the revelry but remains nervous about her reception by the King. Although she is on edge, nothing prepares her for what comes next: the theft of her tapestry and her imprisonment by the Winter King. The Winter King seemed to me unnecessarily cruel and vindictive, unlike the rulers of the other seasons, and I had to wonder why. How will she recover the tapestry? Who can Erith count on for allies in confronting the Winter King? And what secrets did her mother and the Winter King keep from her? The author’s descriptions of this quasi-magical world are of this world are breathtaking, and as I’ve noted with her previous books, I often take time to read them twice because they are so beautiful – such as this one, describing the spring tapestry:  “The landscape formed a square…A medley of greens and blues flowed across the season, the underlying wave overlaid with a handstitched palette of flowers. Butterflies flitted between the blooms of lungwort and foxglove. Rabbit sprinted in the pale grass, and the fish sparkled in a purling stream. The azure sky played host to clouds as soft as lambswool.” I hope I have given you enough of an introduction to the book to compel your interest. This is fantasy at its best, along the lines of the Chronicles of Narnia or Tolkien’s Ring Trilogy. If I could give the book ten stars, I would! About the author: D. Wallace Peach started writing later in life after the kids were grown and a move

Judith Barrow is another in the group of amazing and talented Welsh authors (think Thorne Moore, Iris Gower) whose books I inhale. This one is a psychologically twisted tale of an evil stepmother and the destruction she wreaks on a family that was managing well without her. Lynn nurses a dying, bed-ridden mother and is seen by one of the woman’s eight-year-old twins, Charlie and Chloe, being mean to her – a harbinger of things to come. The story is told from the twins’ point of view. Although the twins are doing well living with their father, Graham, after his wife dies, Lynn worms her way into Graham’s life and he marries her, bringing cruelty and chaos into the family. She is psychotic and a professional manipulator who always gets her way, something the twins recognize immediately but are afraid to tell their father. Lynn has two children of her own, Evie, who befriends the twins, and Saul, a hateful and nasty older boy who antagonizes and bullies Charlie in horrible ways. Charlie hates his stepmother from the beginning, and she gradually gets the cowardly and spineless Graham to believe the lies she tells about Charlie. So much so that he agrees to send Charlie away to a reform school. Chloe is not as obstinate as Charlie but eventually she too is removed from the family and placed in foster care on the basis of Lynn’s lies about her. To control Graham, who at least recognizes that Lynn is tearing his family apart, Lynn begins to drug him until he is all but useless. This allows her access to his money and a life without confrontation to her plans. For the next ten years, the twins, who never see each other, make their way in the life forced on them, with its continuing cruelties and lack of emotional support. But they prove resilient enough to survive to adulthood and thrive, and they never stop hoping they will find each other. Will Charlie and Chloe find each other? Will Lynn finally get her due and Graham be rescued from his useless life? Can his children forgive him? Will Saul finally receive his just rewards? What happens is what kept me turning the pages, looking for the answers to these questions. The answers are almost as convoluted as Lynn’s machinations. I became attached to Charlie and Chloe from the beginning, experiencing each injustice done them personally and wondering what evil their stepmother would do to them next. I became frustrated at the weakness of Graham. What kind of a father is he? I desperately wanted to shake him into reality. Lynn at first seemed a caricature of the evil stepmother, but the author clearly understand the depths of human depravity and I came to understand that Lynn represents a real but twisted person. The only drawback is that I couldn’t imagine a man as weak and compliant at Graham. The author has successfully created a book populated by real people, people you love to hate or just hate or just love.  She has created unexpected twists and turns and the book is a lively read. Recommended for anyone liking a good book about family drama or who just love to hate an evil stepmother. About the author (from Amazon): Judith Barrow is a writer of domestic thrillers, domestic noir, and historical family sagas. Her books include Sisters, published in 2023, and The Memory, which was shortlisted in 2021 for the Wales Book of the Year (the Rhys Davies Trust Fiction Award). Originally from Saddleworth, a group of villages on the Pennines, she has lived in Pembrokeshire, Wales, for over forty years. She has an MA in creative writing, a BA ( Hons) in Literature, and Diploma in Drama. She is a creative writing tutor and holds workshops on all genres. She also attend many festivals and book events and frequently gives talks on creative writing. You can find her at: https://judithbarrowblog.com https://www.facebook.com/judith.barrow.3 1 0

   A few nights ago we got tickets to see the North Carolina Chinese Lantern Festival. It sleeted earlier in the day but by the time we left, the precipitation had nearly ended. However, with temperatures in the upper 30s, we were bundled to the gills for this outside event! The ancient art of Chinese lantern making began in the Han Dynasty (206 BC to 220 AD), a significant period for science and innovation. Each year during Chinese New Year, families view colorful lanterns to symbolize respect and prosperity. The local Chinese  community is host to more than 25 Chinese artisans and performers who arrive in North Carolina in early November to hand assemble lanterns and prepare for exciting Chinese cultural performances during this annual celebration. The colors and the variety of lanterns and lighted figures just blew me away. The amphitheater presented a bouquet of traditional Chinese figures along with representations of fireworks and also Great Barrier Reef.  We spent more than two hours wandering around. I’ll let you judge for yourself how wondrous this was! I loved these blue wisteria! The little boy on the bicycle is my grandson – you have to pump the bike pedals to get the fireworks to light up! I hope you enjoyed my tour of the Festival of Lanterns! 0 0

The book, Run:         Ben Walsh, a Congressional staffer for a US congresswoman, gets a cryptic text from his wife: “I love you. I just need you to know that.”      Up until that morning, Ben and his wife Veronica, a gifted mathematician and professor, seemed a happy, ideal couple. But after this text, Ben cannot locate Veronica. She doesn’t pick up her phone, and when she doesn’t return home by that night, Ben calls on his good friend, Jeremy Wiles, who is running for President, for advice and help.      They discover that her disappearance occurred around the time of a mass shooting along the running route Veronica takes every morning. When another violent death of a family friend and baby sitter occurs, the police begin to suspect that Veronica is somehow involved and could be a suspect.     Ben is unaware that a killer from Veronica’s past, which she’s never revealed to Ben, stalks his family with what appears to the goal of assassinating her. Ben is smart and pulls all the strings he can find to track Veronica down, including her home department. There are clues scattered through the book, from Veronica, based on her knowledge of math and what she’s been able to impart of it to Ben.      Veronica is on the run, hence the title of the book, from her past. There are unexpected twists and turns as Ben tries to find her. No one is as they seem and there are quite a few family ties and connections to be discovered among the threads of the Veronica’s life.      How is Veronica related to the victims? Is she alive, and if so, where is she? ******   My review:        This is the author’s first novel. I enjoyed it, as there were enough twists to keep me occupied and trying to figure things out. However, I was thrown off by the first chapter, the reason for which comes into play much later in the book. And it takes several chapters before the reader gets to Veronica’s disappearance and the beginning of the mystery. These first chapters are slow and I wondered if much of what’s in them was absolutely necessary.      The author writes well and the reader can connect with the various characters, although I have to admit I wasn’t tightly drawn to any of them. Maybe the possible assassin.           The author’s background comes into play in a big way in the writing of this book – see About the Author. I recommend this book (4.5 stars) to readers who will hang with the story to become engaged and who enjoy a story with twists, turns, and unexpected connections. About the author:     Matthew Becker is a mathematician and formerly worked as part of the national Covid-19 response. He has a doctorate in applied mathematics from the University of Maryland, College Park, and is published in the Bulletin of Mathematical Biology. Matthew currently lives with his wife, a U.S. diplomat, and their two children in Washington, DC, before they move to Nicaragua in 2025 for their next overseas tour. His next book, Don’t Look Down, is out on January 14. You can find the author at: Home on X: https://x.com/MattBeckerBooks 1 0

From Bill Watterson, my two favorite characters: 1 0

To my fellow bloggers and friends, may you find peace and joy in this holiday season. 0 0

I’ve been reviewing for Rosie’s Book Review Team for many years – wish I could remember how many, but the first one saved on this computer is from 2016. This year I’ve reviewed nine, down a bit because I joined a book club which seems to love assigning doorstops to read. What I’ve enjoyed about being part of this team is that it’s given me the chance to explore other genres than my own. Since I write cozy mysteries, I started out reviewing just those, but now have expanded – much to my delighted discovery – into sci-fi, fantasy, dystopian fiction, romance, historical fiction and women’s novels. I’ve also made some good blogging buddies through the team. Dystopian fiction is a category I’d never explored, but thanks to the books of Terry Tyler, I’ve become an addict! The most memorable book of the ones I’ve read for the team this year is The Architect of Grayland by Evelyn Arvy.  From my review: “This is an endlessly fascinating and creative science fiction novel. The world building is gradual, as needs must when you have a person set down in a vast area of nothing! I highly recommend this novel (five stars) and think that any reader would enjoy it, not just those of us who like science fiction. This story is more concerned with the strength, determination, and creativeness of the human mind and spirit, which the author portrays in an unusual setting. I hope to see a new book from this author on the #RBRT list in the coming year, along with Tony Riches (an historical fiction writer of Tudor times), and Carol Hedges (as Victorian mystery writer). Along with these three, there are certain other authors whose books I would always agree to review: Thorne Moore, Harald Johnson, and Liza Perrat. Here are the books I reviewed this year. If you are interested, the reviews can be pulled up on this web site. Plutonian Sun by R H Twitcher, Scifi Full Circle by Vered Neta,  HistoricalTales Of The Risen Tide by David Reynalds,  Scifi Pride & Pestilence by Carol Hedges, Histfic Mystery USS PRIMIS: The First Starship by M.H. Altis, Scifi The Twilights by Harald Johnson, Dystopia The Architect of Grayland by Evelyn Arvey, Scifi Run by Matthew Becker, thriller Lake Of Widows by Liza Perrat, Histfic I’m currently preparing to review the latest book from Thorne Moore, of whom I once wrote something like, “she could write about a paper bag and make it interesting,” and a crime thriller by Matthew Becker. 0 0

This novel begins with the introduction of Adrienne Chevalier, wife of a psychiatrist, who lives in an upscale area of Lyon in a chic apartment. Her children are away for the summer and her life is desolate, reduced to keeping the apartment perfect for her controlling husband, who ignores her. One brutally hot day, she forces herself to walk to the grocery store in the oppressive weather to buy food for her husband’s lunch, but when she gets to the checkout station, something snaps. She walks out of the store and wanders off, eventually accepting the offer of a ride by a hippie driving by in a van. He takes her out of the city to the encampment where he lives with others, raising their own food and enjoying sexual freedom. Adrienne hides there, reveling in being free of her husband and the strictures of her life. Eventually, however, she becomes disheartened with the hippie life style and flees to rural Sainte-Marie-du-Lac, a resort area where she had been with her husband. There the owner of the idyllic resort, L’Auberge de Léa, takes pity on her bedraggled state and poverty and gives Adrienne a job that pays, along with a place to stay.    While there, she discovers a leather pouch of valuable coins, which unknown to her, belongs to Blanche Larue. Blanche is the second prominent woman in this book populated by women. Blanche has been trapped by her husband’s infidelity, but is trying to adjust to being newly widowed and free. Her life had always been dictated by the social norms of the village and she has had to gracefully accept her husband’s dalliances. The third woman, Suzanne Rossignol, was the original owner of the auberge many years earlier, and Adrienne finds her journal in the room where she is staying. She discovers that Suzanne’s beloved husband left home to fight in WWI and returned a stranger with a mind destroyed by his experiences. As he became increasingly and erratically brutal to Suzanne, she had to deal with him while providing for them both. Three women, each in a timeless struggle of oppression and patriarchy, tradition and abuse, against a beautiful backdrop of the tranquil French countryside. Their stories are linked by the social strictures of the time: Adrienne by her husband’s diabolical lengths to find and control her, Blanche by the social stigma of blatantly unfaithful husband, and Suzanne by a village that expects her to deal with the daily danger of her mentally ill husband. How these stories tie together will surprise the reader. This is an interesting read about a time of great change in the lives of women, and the author deals with the subject in a fascinating way through the lives of these three main characters, delving into their desires and ambitions and love of family. There are many other women in this book and without exception they are well-drawn and believable, with foibles and talents and dreams. If I had any criticism it is that the men are less so. Emile, Adrienne husband, is sharply presented as a cruel, self-centered man without a shred of empathy, determined to control her at all costs. While the reader is not introduced to Blanche’s husband except by recollection, he seems equally remote, uncaring of his wife, and amoral. Suzanne’s husband is probably the worst example of what happened to men who returned from WWI, alternately physically aggressive and catatonic. Bambou, the hippy who takes Adrienne out of the city is almost a caricature of what people think of as a hippy – warm and loving, handsome with long hair and blue eyes, and definitely enjoying sex not only with Adrienne but also with the other women in the encampment. That is not to say I did not enjoy this book! The author paints a lyrical portrait of the French countryside in details of colors and smells and landscape. I fell in love with the lake community, with its traditions and its food.  It’s definitely a place I would love to visit. The author makes the reader feel great empathy for each of the main characters and to recognize what our own mothers and grandmothers dealt with in their times.   I strongly recommend this book to readers who enjoy women’s fiction set in a turbulent historical time. About the author: Liza Perrat grew up in Wollongong, Australia, where she worked as a general nurse and midwife for fifteen years. When she met her French husband on a Bangkok bus, she moved to France, where she has been living with her family for over twenty years. She works part-time as a French-English medical translator, and as a novelist. Since completing a creative writing course twelve years ago, several of her short stories have won awards, notably the Writers Bureau annual competition of 2004 and her stories have been published widely in anthologies and small press magazines. Spirit of Lost Angels is the first in her French historical trilogy, The Bone Angel series. The second – Wolfsangel – was published in October, 2013, and the third, Blood Rose Angel, was published in November, 2015. She is a founding member of the author collective, Triskele Books and reviews books for BookMuse. You can find her On her website: www.lizaperrat.com Her blog: http://lizaperrat.blogspot.com On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Liza-Perrat-232382930192297/timeline/ 0 0