Roses & Thorns

Roses & Thorns
Showing posts with label Katrina Monroe. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Katrina Monroe. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 15, 2017

#AllDarlingChildren #Fantasy by Katrina Monroe @AuthorKatM




Blurb:

All boys grow up, except one.

On the tenth anniversary of her mother’s death, fourteen-year-old Madge Darling’s grandmother suffers a heart attack. With the overbearing Grandma Wendy in the hospital, Madge runs away to Chicago, intent on tracking down a woman she believes is actually her mother.

On her way to the Windy City, a boy named Peter Pan lures Madge to Neverland, a magical place where children can remain young forever. While Pan plays puppet master in a twisted game only he understands, Madge discovers the disturbing price of Peter Pan’s eternal youth.

About the Author:

Katrina Monroe is a novelist, mom, and snark-slinger extraordinaire.

Her worst habits include: eating pretty much anything with her fingers, yelling at inappropriate times, and being unable to focus on important things like dinner and putting on pants.

She collects quotes like most people collect, well, other things. Her favorite is, “If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they’re happy.” Dorothy Parker


Review:

Having read another of Ms. Monroe’s books, I looked forward to a book with a twisted sense of humor, but what I found in All Darling Children was a book that was just twisted. Peter Pan meets Lord of the Flies. The Lost Boys are not just boys who play Indians with the Red Men, and Captain Hook and Smee are all that’s left of the crew of the Jolly Roger. They, by the way, are ghosts. Under Peter Pan’s leadership, The Lost Boys slaughtered the crew in their sleep. Now, Peter has captured Wendy’s granddaughter. And he intends to have his revenge on Wendy for leaving him all those years ago. And if all of that wasn’t bad enough, the book had an iffy ending. I’m not sure if it was a cliff-hanger leading to a sequel, or just disturbing.

I wanted to put it down halfway through, but I also wanted to see if Madge survived. I was like a bird mesmerized by a snake. It was as bad as reading Salem’s Lot by Stephen King. I will be leery of Ms. Monroe’s books from now on. And if there’s a sequel to All Darling Children, I absolutely do not want to read it. This one gave me enough nightmares, thank you very much. The only reason I’m giving it even two roses is that it was well-written and Wendy was engaging enough that, repulsed as I was, I had to finish it.

Warnings:  Graphic Violence
Length:  217 Pages
Prices:
Print:  $10.99
Digital:  $5.99

You’ll notice we always include the publisher’s buy link. That’s because authors usually receive 40-50% of the net proceeds from the publisher. Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%. When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left. So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40-$2.99. If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $1.70-$2.10.

Download the file from the publisher onto your computer as you would any other file. I’ve created a folder for books on my computer, with subfolders by source (Marketing for Romance Writers, Net Galley, Authors who find me on Kindle lists, etc.). That way, if there’s a glitch with your Kindle, the books are on your computer. Some publishers send books in all digital formats. If my Kindle breaks and my kids buy me a Nook, I won’t have to replace all of my books. If you have a Kindle and your hubby has a Nook, you won’t have to buy separate copies, so buying directly from the publisher can save you money.

Moving the file from your computer to your e-reader is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive. Plug the larger USB end of your e-reader charging chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from the folder into which you’ve downloaded the book to Documents/Books directory on your e-reader. You can move the file by highlighting it and dragging it to the documents directory in you Kindle you want to move it to. Or right click on it, and then left click copy or move. Or hit Control/C for copy, Control/X for cut, and Control/V for paste.

Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.

Thanks for visiting.

Sunday, October 30, 2016

Sacrificial Lamb Cake by Katrina Monroe



Blurb:

Oh. My. God.

Rain Johnson escaped the insanity of her radical environmentalist family, only to end up waitressing for a living. Her scale of success—with her at the bottom—only goes as high as that college degree she never got, until she gets one hell of an epiphany from a Trinity Corporation public-relations guy who calls himself Jude. He tells her she’s the Lamb of God, and it’s time for that whole Second Coming thing. But when her first minor miracle gets her arrested, and an ecoterrorist using the name Messiah starts blowing up pesticide plants, Rain and Judas are in for way more apocalypse than either of them expected.

Jude scrambles to save his personal plan for salvation, but Lucy, the devil herself, has her own well-laid plans. It doesn’t matter that Rain’s a conflict-avoiding lesbian and Jude is history’s worst traitor. They’re all that stands between humanity and an end of the world that wasn’t supposed to happen.

About the Author:

Katrina Monroe is a novelist, mom, and snark-slinger extraordinaire.

Her worst habits include: eating pretty much anything with her fingers, yelling at inappropriate times, and being unable to focus on important things like dinner and putting on pants.

She collects quotes like most people collect, well, other things. Her favorite is, “If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they’re happy.”—Dorothy Parker

Review:

The Second Coming is here—in the form of Rain Johnson, a lesbian waitress with spiky red hair, a snarky attitude, and a potty-mouth. And her guide through the murky waters of miracles and succoring the masses is a guy from the Trinity Corporation who calls himself Jude. We know him better as Judas Iscariot, and this is his chance at redemption.

What neither of them counted on was an eco-terrorist calling itself Messiah blowing up fertilizer plants who resembles Rain right down to the color and style of her hair. Or the fact that Messiah’s working for Lucy, better known as Lucifer. Of course the Devil’s a woman. Jude wants to avoid the whole plague/battle between the returned Messiah and the Anti-Christ scene, but apparently Lucy has other plans. How can a waitress with Judas Iscariot and a whole walloping three human disciples possibly defeat Lucifer, the Anti-Christ, and a bunch of demons?

Everyone assumes the Messiah must be a straight man when he returns. Why couldn’t she be a lesbian? And a broke, snarky one at that? And why couldn’t Judas have a chance to make amends? I found Sacrificial Lamb Cake funny and thought-provoking, and despite a few editing glitches, I’m still giving it five roses.

Warnings:  Language
Length:  254 Pages
Prices:
Print:  $9.99
Digital:  $4.99

You’ll notice we always include the publisher’s buy link. That’s because authors usually receive 40-50% of the net proceeds from the publisher. Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%. When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left. So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40-$2.99. If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $1.70-$2.10.

Download the file from the publisher onto your computer as you would any other file. I’ve created a folder for books on my computer, with subfolders by source (Marketing for Romance Writers, Net Galley, Authors who find me on Kindle lists, etc.). That way, if there’s a glitch with your Kindle, the books are on your computer. Some publishers send books in all digital formats. If my Kindle breaks and my kids buy me a Nook, I won’t have to replace all of my books. If you have a Kindle and your hubby has a Nook, you won’t have to buy separate copies, so buying directly from the publisher can save you money.

Moving the file from your computer to your e-reader is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive. Plug the larger USB end of your e-reader charging chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from the folder into which you’ve downloaded the book to Documents/Books directory on your e-reader. You can move the file by highlighting it and dragging it to the documents directory in you Kindle you want to move it to. Or right click on it, and then left click copy or move. Or hit Control/C for copy, Control/X for cut, and Control/V for paste.

Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.

Thanks for visiting.