Book Review: All the Blood We Share: A Novel of the Bloody Benders of Kansas by Camilla Bruce

All the Blood We Share: A Novel of the Bloody Benders of Kansas

by Camilla Bruce
November 22, 2022
Publisher: Berkley
ASIN: B09T5WN94D 

ISBN: 9780593102596
A sinister novel based on the real Bloody Benders, a family of serial killers in the old West bound by butchery and obscured by the shadows of American history.

The winds shift nervously on the Kansas plain whispering of travelers lost and buried, whispering of witches. Something dark and twisted has taken root at the Bender Inn.

At first the townspeople of Cherryvale welcome the rising medium Kate Bender and her family. Kate's messages from the Beyond give their tedious dreams hope and her mother's potions cure their little ills—for a price. No one knows about their other business, the shortcut to a better life. And why shouldn’t their family prosper? They’re careful. It’s only from those who are marked, those who travel alone and can easily disappear, that the Benders demand their pound of flesh.

But even a gifted seer like Kate can make a misstep. Now as the secrets festering beneath the soil of the family orchard threaten to bring them all to ruin, the Benders must sharpen their craft—or vanish themselves.

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Kate and her “Ma” meet her stepfather, William, and his son, John, in the town of Cherryvale. They had to flee from Pennsylvania because Kate did something. Kate wants to lay low for a while but she wants to be a famous psychic. But again, Kate’s nature has her doing what she did back in Pennsylvania. And soon, all became a family of serial killers.

Based on a family of serial killers in the Old West, the author shares her own take on who they might have been and where they all went. She digs deep into each person’s psyche on how they turn to murder, especially Kate. All the Blood We Share will pull the reader into the madness of a scary tale of real serial killers from the past that could give the movie ones, like Michael Myers and others, a run for their money.

I give All the Blood We Share 4 sheep.

Reviewed by Pamela K. Kinney

About the Author:

Website

Camilla Bruce was born in central Norway and grew up in an old forest, next to an Iron Age burial mound. She has a master's degree in comparative literature, and have co-run a small press that published dark fairy tales. Camilla currently lives in Trondheim with her son and cat.

Sheep Book Review: Charming by Krystal Wade

Charming
by Krystal Wade
Paperback, 208 pages
October 6th 2014
by Curiosity Quills Press

They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, and that's great . . . as long as you don't die. 

Sixteen-year-old Haley Tremaine had it all: top-notch school, fantastic family, and a bright future, but all of that changed when an accident tore her family apart. Now, an alcoholic father, a bitter younger sister, and a cold headstone bearing her mother’s name are all she has left.

Chris Charming has it all: a powerful CEO for a father, a prestigious school, and a fortune at his fingertips, but none of that matters when he lands a reputation as a troublemaker. Struggling to follow in his father’s footsteps, he reaches out to the one person he believes truly sees him, the one person he wants: Haley.

Little do they know someone's determined to bring the two together, even if it means murder.

Haley Tremaine lives with her father and younger sister, Jocelyn. Her mother has been dead for a while, ever since the car accident she and Haley were in. Before she died, her mother made Haley promise to never tell Jocelyn the truth and to look after her. Sadly, that leads to hell for Haley, as her father hates her for looking like her mother and abuses her. She fights to keep the abuse from her sister. Jocelyn is Daddy’s beloved little girl. Her only saving graces are her best friend, Christine and the Berkshires Candle Company she has a part time job at, selling candles in their store. This is the same company her mother had been CEO before her death. No longer making money to stay in her former prestigious school, but now attending a regular high school, Haley appears to be heading down in her grades, unlike her former life and no longer with a boyfriend as she had before. But a young man Chris Charming, whose father is the current CEO of Berkshires and still goes to that prestigious school, is interested in her. But he has a bad boy reputation, one he isn’t denying. And he seems to not take no for an answer from Haley about going out with him. If her life isn’t bad enough, there appears to be a serial killer in town and maybe it might be someone she knows….

I enjoyed reading the story, though I wanted to smack Haley myself for not telling someone about the abuse her father was doing to her, just so her sister won’t learn the truth? A sister I suspected might know, but let it go on? That part just bugged me. Otherwise the mystery of the killer and the romance as she began to let down her defenses against Chris made it a pretty good story, despite Haley letting the abuse go on.

I give Charming 4 sheep.

Pamela K. Kinney

About the Author:

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I’m happily married to the love of my life (don’t gag) and raising three beautiful children in the gorgeous state of Virginia. We live just outside Washington, D.C., and every day I wake up to find myself stuck in traffic trying to get there.

The horrid commute gives me plenty of time to zone out and think about my characters in full, brilliant details (I’m a safe driver; don’t worry). Stories give me a way to forget about the sometimes smelly strangers sitting next to me on the fifty mile trek into town (I pick up hitchhikers every day. True story. Check out www.slug-lines.comif you don’t believe me).

I’ve been a part of organized hitchhiking for nearly fifteen years, but that’s just one small aspect of my oh-so-large life. When I’m not working, commuting, or chasing after my three children (four if you count the man), you can usually find me outside talking to my chickens like they’re the cutest things in the world (they are), or training my amazing dogs how to herd said chickens (which they love), or curled up on the sofa with a good book (why can’t that be 100% of the time?).

I hope you love my stories (or just like them a little; that would be okay, too). And I hope that one day you find your passion, because there’s nothing in life better than doing what you love while surrounded by people you love.

Book Review: Clean by Alex Hughes

Clean (Mindspace Investigations #1) by Alex Hughes

A RUTHLESS KILLER- OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND

I used to work for the Telepaths’ Guild before they kicked me out for a drug habit that wasn’t entirely my fault. Now I work for the cops, helping Homicide Isabella Cherabino put killers behind bars.

My ability to get inside the twisted minds of suspects makes me the best interrogator in the department. But the normals keep me on a short leash. When the Tech Wars ripped the world apart, the Guild stepped up to save it. But they had to get scary to do it—real scary.

Now the cops don’t trust the telepaths, the Guild doesn’t trust me, a serial killer is stalking the city—and I’m aching for a fix. But I need to solve this case. Fast. I’ve just had a vision of the future: I’m the next to die.

Clean is a new urban fantasy with an interesting main character. He is a powerful telepath who has been kicked out of the Guild because of a drug habit. He is no longer trusted by anyone at the Guild. He works as a consultant for the Police Dept and helps out with the interrogations, since he can use his abilities to get the truth out of the suspects that the “norms” cannot. I’m not quite sure how the leveling goes for those with abilities, but it is mentioned a few times in the book that the main character is a Level 8 telepath.

The relationships that are in the book are very strained, and rightfully so, the main character has lost trust with pretty much everyone around him. He is having a very difficult time trying to stay off the drugs and get his job done at the same time. He tries to keep his distance while being protective of his partner Isabella.

If you are wondering, yes the main character does have a name, but you do not find it out until the end of the book, and it threw me for a loop that I didn’t notice the entire time I was reading Clean that the main character's name was never mentioned.

Parts of this book screamed out scenes of The Lawnmower Man by Stephen King, in a very good way. You find out what kind of testing the Guild has been doing to help people increase their abilities. Along with the use of AO’s (artificial organs) which made me think of Ghost in the Shell. If you are the kind of person that is into the cyber-punk style of book you will like this one.

4 Sheep

Guest Reviewer: Danielle D.

About the author:

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Alex Hughes was born in Savannah, GA and moved to the south Atlanta area when she was eight years old. Shortly thereafter, her grandfather handed her a copy of Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonrider series, and a lifelong obsession with scifi was born.

Alex is a graduate of the prestigious Odyssey Writing Workshop and a Semi-Finalist in the 2011 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards. Her short pieces are published in several markets including EveryDay Fiction and White Cat Magazine. She blogs about writing craft, revision, and editing at SmallTriumphs.com.

Alex’s work is complex, dark, adventurous, and a little funny, with a emphasis on great characters and interesting worlds. She gets her inspiration from history (she majored with a European history focus in college), family members, and headlines, as well as whatever book she has in her hand. Lately she’s been reading neuroscience books; the brain’s a cool, cool place and the mind even more so.

An avid cook and foodie, Alex loves great food of any stripe – even better if she can figure out how to put it together. Great food is like a great book; it has lots of layers that work together beautifully, and the result is delicious and harmonious. She’s working on figuring out Indian food right now – suggestions welcome!

Alex loves swing dancing, tetris, music of all kinds, and has been known to get into long conversations with total strangers at restaurants about the Food Network, much to the embarrassment of her sister. She can also balance a spoon on her nose while crossing her eyes, and talk for hours about absolutely nothing.

Sheep Review: The Taken by Vicki Pettersson + Give Away

The Taken (Celestial Blues #1) by Vicki Pettersson

He’s a fallen angel. She’s a rockabilly reporter. Together they must solve a deadly string of murders plaguing the mortal and the immortal worlds.

Griffin Shaw used to be a PI, but that was over fifty years ago when gumshoes hoofed the streets . . . and he was still alive. Now he’s a Centurion, an angel who assists other murdered souls through their journey to the afterlife. But while Shaw might be an angel … he’s no saint. Haunted by the mysterious events surrounding his own death, he seizes a chance to wreak some vengeance when he witnesses a deadly attack on journalist Katherine “Kit” Craig.

Joining forces, the unlikely avengers take to the streets, hunting a killer whose trail of bodies stretches across Las Vegas and into an immortal netherworld. It is a dangerous trek that lead them into the darkest corners of Sin City and into the heart of an evil conspiracy extending beyond the lights of the Strip that could destory them both.

But destruction isn’t the only threat Griffin faces. The closer he gets to Kit, the more he finds himself bewitched by her mortal charms. Can he resist falling under her spell? And does he want to?

If you are a fan of Vicki’s “OMG fabulous” dark Urban Fantasy series Signs of the Zodiac, like I am, and have been looking forward her new Celestial Blues series you need to stop right here for a second…(1 Mississippi)…The Taken is not like her previous books. I made the mistake of diving into it with preconceived ideas and that made it hard for me to be objective. I finished The Taken well over a week ago and haven’t written this review till now because I needed to step back and forget about what I thought it should have been. This is not an urban fantasy; it crosses many genre lines but I think dark paranormal mystery/thriller  with romance pretty much covers it. <G>

 

I really like Vicki’s spin on the angel mythos; when someone dies they go into the Everlast, this would be like heaven. Some people get to go straight there and some are sent to a dark forest inhabited by the Third, the portion of the angelic host that followed Lucifer against God. The forest of the Third is briefly touched on, but hopefully will be explored more deeply in future books. Pures were the first angels created by God and they serve him but don’t have much to do with human souls. Those who die violently have to be put in incubation where they get past the memory and regret of their death then enter the Everlast. Some souls aren’t able to let go of their past and they become Centurions, a low form of angel, who have to usher other violently killed souls in hopes that by helping others they will alleviate their own mental anguish and move into the Everlast. Griffin Shaw was a private investigator when he and his wife were brutally murdered 50 years ago. Incubation wasn’t able to erase his need to know who killed them and why so he became a Centurion.

 

The Taken has a few issues you find with most debut series, for example the characters feel a little stiff as if the author hasn’t quite gotten comfortable with them yet. The beginning is slow and I found easy to set it down. I understand there was a need to do some character development and world building, and it is done well, but there just wasn’t a lot of action, instead we meet many characters as multiple storylines are slowly woven together. My favorite character is Anne (Anas) a Pure with an attitude problem that finds her fate connected to Grif. Through her experiences we learn information about angels and their purpose in the Everlast. The second half of the book is when the sh** hits the fan story-wise and it ends with a bang. I love Griffin Shaw, Pettersson did a great job of portraying what a man from the 50’s would act and think like. He is a man of few words, yet capable of loving passionately. I liked his journey of letting go of his past and grabbing hold of his future. Kit Craig was likable, but I didn’t connect to her like I did with the other characters and I honestly don’t know why. The rockabilly aspect was interesting, but it seemed to overshadow the character. She also had to learn to let go of her past and trust love again. The irony of Kit and Grif’s relationship was very clever as well as the contrast of Kit’s rockabilly lifestyle and the harshness of the murder investigation that turns in to something much worse.

The villains in this book aren’t the supernatural kind, but they are just as evil as any I have read, almost disturbingly so. The story deals with rape, murder and the selling of young girls as sex slaves.

 

This is a good start to a new series and I don’t think The Taken should be used to judge how the rest of the series will develop. There are some wonderful possibilities that can be explored in the world Pettersson has created and I look forward to reading about them. 

 

3.5 Sheep

SharonS (edited by BAK)

Find Vicki Pettersson online

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Sheep Review: Fair Game by Patricia Briggs + Giveaway

By: Sharon Stogner
Co-Founder & Media Relations
*I received this ARC copy from Penguin Group USA


“Leslie learned two valuable things about the fae that day. They were powerful and charming-and they ate children and puppies.” Pg. 7 Fair Game

After reading this sentence I knew I was going to love this book, as well as Briggs. Fair Game is the third book in Patricia Briggs's Alpha and Omega series, and the first Briggs' book I have read. I am a big dark Urban Fantasy fan and people have been telling me for years to try her books, and let me just say I was not disappointed. Even though I jumped into this series at book three, I had no problem immersing myself into the impressive world Briggs has created and her unique characters. She is a master storyteller, creating a cast of characters I quickly connected to, as well as a story which was fast-paced, riveting and written particularly damn well.

They say opposites attract. And in the case of werewolves Anna Latham and Charles Cornick, they mate. The son-and enforcer-of the leader of the North American werewolves, Charles is a dominant alpha. While Anna, an omega, has the rare ability to calm others of her kind.

Now that the werewolves have revealed themselves to humans, they can't afford any bad publicity. Infractions that could have been overlooked in the past must now be punished, and the strain of doing his father's dirty work is taking a toll on Charles.

Nevertheless, Charles and Anna are sent to Boston, when the FBI requests the pack's help on a local serial killer case. They quickly realize that not only the last two victims were werewolves-all of them were. Someone is targeting their kind. And now Anna and Charles have put themselves right in the killer's sights...

My favorite paranormal creatures are the Fae and shifters, and guess what this story is about? Needless to say, I was thrilled. The plot of this book focuses on two major story arcs carried over from the first two books of the series, as well as a new mystery that must be solved in this one. Anna and Charles are mated in this book, but his job as the Pack enforcer and executioner is having a negative impact on his mental health and by extension his relationship with Anna. I absolutely love Charles, he's an old school alpha male, which means he doesn’t apologize for or try to hide what he is. Others around him submit without even realizing what they are doing. Charles carries the world on his shoulders and feels the need to always be strong, only he has finally met his match and instead of protecting his mate he has put her in danger. I also love Briggs’s werewolf mythology, in which the wolf is a distinct and separate personality from the human. The wolf and man take care of each other and consult to decide the best way to handle things. Sometimes one will take control without asking, especially if it's to protect themselves or their mate. Anna is an Omega, a rare type of werewolf, she has a calming effect on those around her and alphas can’t force her into submission, making her the perfect match for Charles. I like her strong will and gentle touch and I find their romance passionate and swoon worthy.

Not only do Charles and Anna have to work on their relationship, they must jump through political hoops while containing a P.R. nightmare with the human world. The werewolves and other supernatural creatures like the Fae and witches are trying to co-exist with humans, but it isn’t going very well. It appears that someone is trying to sabotage the delicate peace. In this book, Anna and Charles are working with the FBI to track a serial killer who is preying upon Weres and Fae. Anna and Charles hope that by working with the FBI they can prove that humans and shifters can work together. In this particular case, someone or something has kidnapped the human daughter of a very old Fae Lord who will stop at nothing to get her back. Alistair Beauclaire is everything I love about the Fae; old, confident, powerful, and indifferent except when it comes to the ones he loves. Alistair said it best when talking to Charles about what he is willing to do to save his child.

“It is not wise to give something old and powerful something they care about. And I am very old.” pg. 126 Fair Game

Briggs has created a complex and captivating world that I can’t wait to visit again. The story, characters and quality of writing make this a must read.

5 "smitten with Briggs" sheep

Berkley Publishing Group (Ace) is offering a signed copy of On the Prowl to one lucky reader. US ONLY
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