Carries Book Reviews

Dark Shadows by Toni Vallan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When a group of high school bullies lock Ella Raimi inside of a janitorial closet on a Friday night and leave her there she isn’t found until Saturday morning. Ella is in a state of shock when found and as she comes out of it she insists she OK and doesn’t want to involve the police about her bullies.

Ella only has one friend, Kyla. Kyla stays with Ella after her incident and tries to care for her but shortly after the closet incident Ella begins to have horrible nightmares and find she wakes up to finding things have happened and no memory of them. Is Kyla somehow to blame? Is Ella doing these things in her sleep??

An excellent psychological thriller that pulls you in from the first moments of Ella being locked up in the closet and won’t let go until the end. I did however figure out the ending fairly early on but even with guessing I still didn’t want to put the story down until done.

Ella pulled me into her story from the first few moments just knowing that she would have such an interesting story to tell and definitely was not disappointed in the least. A rather emotional roller coaster that even when finishing a part of me is still thinking noooo I want to read more about Ella and what will happen. Always find it good to have a story or characters that it’s hard to let them go when finished.

Great fast paced read that was tough to put down until finished.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Releasing Her Dragon by Elianne Adams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Stella Montrose is a female dragon who lost her entire family years ago so she doesn’t quite know all of what there is about being a dragon. She does know she is close to turning into her dragon form and if she doesn’t find her mate before she turns she won’t be able to turn back into human form.

Brycen Conners is supposed to be Stella’s mate but he has been avoiding her to finish his job before claiming her. When Stella tracks him down and asks to be released he refuses to do so.

Enjoyed the story building with the dragons and their turning and the hot and steamy relationship between Stella and Brycen. I did think it lacked a bit in telling why Brycen was so determined to stick with his job before meeting Stella as it would seem that the two could have mated and then returned to it. Just wasn’t really clear on why it was so important to him beforehand.

Otherwise, interesting paranormal erotic quick read.

I received a copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Ghost of a Chance by Kelly Apple
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

After a run of bad luck in life Chance Harker finds himself a ghost and is living better than he was when he was alive. He has a job as PI and lives in a hotel but finds himself missing having a sex life. When he sees an ad for a research facility looking in sexual issues he can’t help but want to check it out.

This is a very short story to start off the Pinnacle Point series. It’s hard to say much without giving the whole thing away which I wouldn’t want to do but I will say it actually made me chuckle a few times and there was a bit of steamy but yet amusing erotica at the end. Cute start to a paranormal erotic tale.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Alice Takes Back Wonderland by David D. Hammons
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ten years after Alice’s trip to Wonderland we now have a seventeen year old Alice who struggles with her parents still not believing what she saw was real and have put her on medication to distinguish fantasy from reality.

One day the White Rabbit returns for Alice to get her help in saving Wonderland from being taken over from the Ace of Spades who is stripping Wonderland’s residents of their Wonder and trying to make it more like our world. Alice takes a little convincing that what she’s seeing is real after years of being told it’s in her imagination.

Alice then embarks on a journey to find the Sleeping Beauty and along the way meets up with many other fairy tale characters who she tries to recruit to help save Wonderland.

I actually rather enjoyed this creative story using characters that we all know and love but not just copying their original stories. There were new ideas mixed in to each character along with an overall adventure to bring them all together which I found rather engaging.

When the story started off I had a bit of a problem connecting with Alice as a seventeen year old, she seemed to lack a bit of maturity. But in the end I think she grew and I believe the character actually needed that bit in the beginning to show her struggles through the years with no one believing her so in the end I had changed my mind about her.

As for the other characters being brought in to the story I rather enjoyed the creativity with them all. Things aren’t exactly the way you’d think for each but there is a reasoning given in the story behind it. This made this one of my favorite retellings as I love when I get a whole new story loosely based on originals instead of the same story being retold again.

Overall, fun read that I’d definitely recommend checking out.

I received a copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

A Christmas Homecoming by Melissa McClone
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Josiah Whittaker is a billionaire tech genius who after having a health scare returns to his hometown of Marietta, Montana to stay at the Bar V5 ranch to recover. Shortly after arriving Josiah meets Ellie Smith who works as a housekeeper at the ranch but Josiah had been friends with Ellie’s older brother who had passed away back when they were all growing up. The two quickly become friends but both have their own reasons for holding back from anything more.

Another beautiful hometown love story taking place in Marietta. Such a lovely town with lovely people that completely wrap you up in the Christmas spirit throughout the story. Absolutely love these characters, Ellie was such a wonderful young woman who dedicated her life to helping others that were going through what she had when she was growing up and Josiah despite claiming to not like Christmas quickly fell into the holiday cheer and showed what a good man he was.

Lovely story that I’d highly recommend.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.