Marvel "Tsum Tsum" Takeover! (Chabot/Baldeón)

Marvel "Tsum Tsum" Takeover!
Written by Jacob Chabot Illustrated by David Baldeón (2017)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

Once again, I am always on the lookout for graphic novels that I can use in my classroom for Free Read Friday. I have a "Graphic Novel" class in my high school. I found Marvel "Tsum Tsum" Takeover! in a Little Free Library in my neighborhood (along with a two other Cartoon Network books that I started reading and immediately passed on).

The image above is a photo of the cover that I took with my iPad. I usually take the images from Amazon, but it had a different cover. The only matching images I could find where also photographs, so I took my own.

I must've missed the "Tsum Tsum" Craze of a decade ago. I didn't have kids back then and my nephew would've been too little. (Plus he was into stuffed monkeys and pandas that looked like animals, not sleeping capsules.)

On the Marvel side of things, I got most of the references, and recognized most of the characters, either from sporadic reading, from the movies and TV, or just from online conversation.

The basic storyline is that a crate of alien creatures was on its way to The Collector when it's lost and crashes into a roof in Brooklyn where three kids in a superhero club find it. Inside are little capsule-shaped aliens (maybe the length of a kid's forearm) who seem to like the Avengers and superheros. The kids show them videos on their phones, which includes hearing the original Spider-Man cartoon theme song and "You wouldn't like me when I'm angry." The Tsum Tsum take on the characteristics of some of the Avengers, right down to their powers.

As a backdrop to this, Ulton has been spotted in Brooklyn, and Iron Man and other heroes are trying to stop him.

As a complication, there's a mean guy living in the kids' building who is actually a low-level crook who just got out of prison and can't get work -- as a criminal. He captures the Spider-Man alien and shows it super villain videos. The alien splits into four, which become Venom, Green Goblin, Rhino, and Ultron. He then trains them to rob a bank, where they take out Ant-Man before they turn on him.

The Collector shows up. Ultron shows up. The Avengers show up. The kids help save the day but are still grounded.

Basically, a dopey story but still kind of fun. I noticed that the aliens have the red and blue Spidey suit and Don Blake Thor, but the book has the red and black Spider-Man suit (and I'm not entirely sure whose in that suit) and Thor is a woman. (I haven't seen that movie, but I remember the fake outrage about the comics.) Ms. Marvel appears but Captain Marvel does not (except in a variant cover). There is a Captain Marvel alien though.

The book is short -- 120 pages, which is four issues combined -- and the last 20 pages or so are just variant covers by different artists featuring different characters (many of which don't appear in this book).

I hope some of my students enjoy it even if they don't get the references or know who all the characters are.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

The Berry Pickers (Peters)

Nothing to See Here
Amanda Peters (2023)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a Pandemic Book Club aleternate selection. It was my month to select three books, and I immediately put the books, ebooks, and/or audiobooks on hold at the libraries. I started listening to this before the vote started. It recieved no votes. I listened to the audio (Chapter 1 twice), and I think I will read the book when it becomes available, particularly if it isn't until summer. (For this reason, I included the book cover, which I don't usually do for audiobooks.)

This was not a happy book, and it was a long-term story. Early on, we know that this story is being told by the characters when they are older, but it isn't readily obvious how old they are, and that makes it a little depressing.

The story has two narrators: a woman who was adbucted as a child in 1962 and grows up to realize that something isn't right, and the youngest older brother who blames himself for her disappearance. Of the two, the Ruthie/Norma is more compelling. Joe's story seems almost pointless -- his addiction and his running away from his wife (whom he didn't know was pregnant) don't add to Ruthie's story. It's not like he sees her at any point.

Ruthie is a Mi'kmaq girl from Nova Scotia who vanishes from a berry-picking camp in Maine. The story follows the aftermath for her family and the girl who grows up in a different life, haunted by fragmented memories.

There are some inconsistencies in Norma's story. She realizes things are wrong (she's not in old photos she finds before they disappear and her skin color doesn't match her family), and later reveals that she assumes that she was adopted. But there are other times where it seems that she believes that she's her new mother's daughter, particularly after she miscarries.

Side note: the miscarriage in this book carried some weight and had some fallout, so it wasn't as bad I've complained about in other reviews where it seems like a pointless trope used to generate drama or some kind of emotional earthquake.

Also, when Norma mentions she and Aunt Ruthie cleaning out her mother's house, I got the impression (it might've been stated, or I might've assumed it) that her mother had already died. By the way, this was depressing because this memory happens early in the book. Later, Norma lives the truth before her mother's death.

*** Spoilers: ***

Ruthie doesn't learn the truth until she's in her 50s, so despite being loved by her adbuctors and treated as their real daughter, her entire life was stolen from her. Her mother's problems with having children causes Norma to decide after her miscarriage that she doesn't wish to try for more children. This causes her husband to leave her, and she doesn't remarry.

Joe doesn't get to see Norma until he's on his deathbed. Likewise, he's too embarrassed to go back just to meet his own daughter, who is accepting of him, at least. Ruthie/Norma at least gets to meet some of her birth family, but her father and oldest brother have already passed away by this point.

*** END OF Spoilers: ***

Other than it being depressing, I can't find a reason to hate it or not recommend it, if you like depressing stories like this.


If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Deep Sky (Kitasei)

Deep Sky
by Yume Kitasei (2026)

[AUDIOBOOK]

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This was a random audiobook that I downloaded from the library because it was science fiction and it was short. I wasn't really fair to this book, as I downloaded it three different times, with other books in between, before I finished. I won't rate it, but I think, had I listened to it continuously over three or four weeks, I still wouldn't have a really high opinion of it. Also, I finished this last month, and then forgot about it. It should've been, probably, five or six entries ago.

I listen to audio books when I'm walking. However, the month of February had few walks in it because of the terrible weather and the snow.

The book starts as a sci-fi whodunit, an explosion on a ship on a one-way mission to start a new colony, which in itself was fine. But it blends in a second timeline of the women training to get picked for the mission, which was less satisfying to me. It was a way to get some information about the characters, but the competition is fierce so characters who didn't make it are included, which adds drama, but doesn't do much to solve the explosion.

Stealing from Google AI: The story is a science fiction thriller about a mission to colonize a new planet to save humanity from Earth's environmental collapse, focusing on a crew of young women who must uncover a saboteur after a lethal explosion occurs on their ship, The Phoenix. It's told from the perspective of the last-minute recruit Asuka. It blends a "whodunit" mystery with coming-of-age themes, exploring identity, belonging, and the relationships between the crew members as they navigate high-stakes survival and their own personal histories.

Me again: So the Earth is doomed, and we need colony ships. The first ship has 80 women on board and will take 20 years to get there. They live aboard the ship for 20 years -- no hypersleep. The women will also be artificially impregnated along the way so that humanity can start quickly. I was a little confused about this at first, but some of the children will be born and start to grow up on the spaceship.

The bombing forces they to solve the mystery before they can continue. Was the explosion an accident? Was it sabotage? Was it preplanned or is the saboteur on the ship? They come to believe that the saboteur is among them and need to figure it out and fix all the damage before it's too late to get back on course, or they'll live out the rest of their lives in space until the air scrubbers eventually stop working (many years from now). The children that will be born will have no future.

And, of course, there's the possibility of returning to Earth 20 years after launch, achieving nothing.

After a while, the backstories in the year before the launch bored me. Asuka, the protagonist (and narrator), is an unlikely candiate, but as events turn, she ends up being included, not through a Hero's Journey, but more through politics and bad luck for other people. It actually undermines your faith in the character to fix the problem. The resolution to the bombing was okay.

I'm not going to rate it on Good Reads because I don't know if it deserves 4 stars, but I don't want to give it 3 stars because of the way I listened to it. Maybe the Earth stories might've interested me more. I don't know.

I have no plans to read the book after listening to it.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Watchmen (Moore)

Watchmen
Written by Alan Moore,
Artist Dave Gibbons, and Colorist John Higgins (1987)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

I know this is Moore's story, but the artwork really drives it, sometimes incredibly so. Also, I added the colorist's name (above) along with the artist because the colors and shading were a major part of the atmosphere.

Alan Moore's Watchmen started publishing around the time I graduated college. I had friends who were really into it. Finally, a friend loaned me his trade paperback -- he overestimated the speed at which I read. Anyway, I have vague recollections of the story. And I remember the extra material wasn't exactly extra -- the stuff at the end was similar to online extras for movies these days. One of the problems I had back then was that the first couple of issues had fake excerpts of a biography of one of the heroes. It was several pages of small print. I don't read comic books for multiple pages of small print. If I wanted to do that, I'd just read a book -- and back then, I didn't read that many books. This was mostly because I didn't read quickly, didn't set a lot of time aside for reading, and often picked the wrong books.

Ironically, my graphic novel class is the reason I picked this up again. I would love to share this with my students but I just can't. Nothing wrong with the story, but the copy came from my brother's apartment and it's from the 80s. I can't say that it's a first printing or anything like that, but it's valuable to me sentimentally more than monetarily. And my students are just not into my class. It's "basket weaving" to them. Many of them can't even read English, and without the use of their phones, they can't translate the text. Basically, they don't care and wouldn't appreciate it. So I'm protecting this book, and I'll find others for them.

For those unaware, this was probably the first deconstruction of superheroes. (If not the first, it was the first one to make a splash this loud!) The heroes were based on the Charlton characters that DC acquired, but the concept was so out there that the characters would be forever tainted and unusable ever again. So the serial numbers were filed off and the story redone.

Reading this nearly 40 years later, it's amazing to see not only how well it holds up but to compare it with more modern graphic novels, or even comic book collections published as trade paperbacks (but not necessarily one complete story). I don't read so many regular comics any more, but, of course, I've upped the number of graphic novels. The nine-panel per page layout is a bit of a throwback just in itself. And now that I'm teaching about these comics, I'm noticing things, such as how the story manages to switch focus at the end of the page, and when it doesn't, the first pages of the following page serve as a transition. I noticed the reuse of a lot of artwork as themes and moments (and time in general) are repeated. That must've saved a bit of time.

I actually put the physical book aside for a while and waited for the ebook to be available from the library. Regardless, I still read the physical book in class on Fridays in front of my students. But the ebook had two advantages: first, zooming in on the dialogue and the backgrounds, second, screen grabs of images that I'd like to use in class next year. I was taking photos with my phone (fair use), but they are warped from bent pages and they have light reflecting. Many websites that I visit for information about graphic novels will use images from Watchmen, so I figured this would be the best way. If nothing else, I could replace the photos I took.

Moving on...

Once again, I skipped the additional material at the end of each chapter (issue) and went back to them later. Some of the stuff that I remembered was stuff people had told me from those pages. I came back to them before the book was due back at the library. The novel was probably the worst to get through. The sheer variety of the material was intriguing, even being true the subject matter, including typos or bad typesetting. I wonder how much time and effort went into making those right, as opposed to writing the regular book. If nothing else, you got the sense that the world really thought that the costumed heroes were a little nutty particularly after the villains traded in their crazy clothing for well-manicured suits. The real enemy of the 1950 (other than McCarthyism, of course) was organized crime. Even the Superman TV show went there - fighting organized crime instead of Lex Luthor or Brainiac.

If anything, I had a better feel for the older period, the past of the story, then I might've had 40 years ago when that stuff was only 40 years old. One thing that still stands out was Rorshach's origin, or at least, the origin of his mask, which was tied to Kitty Genovese, which was something that I learned about in college or somewhat afterward. I might've heard the story before that and hadn't known the name.

I didn't remember a lot of the imagery, especially involving the Comedian. Looking at it now, it's obvious. But, hey, I think I rushed to read it the first time so I could give it back.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Class Is in Session: Teaching Through the Chaos (Patt)

Class Is in Session: Teaching Through the Chaos
by Shantel N. Patt (2026)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a free Advanced Reader Copy from Library Thing. I'm encouraged (but not required) to leave reviews in exchange for the free books.

I left the following review on the Library Thing website:

Ms. Patt's background is not my background, and her experiences are not my experiences. However, I recognize her struggles and her frustrations because they're basically universal for all teachers. (I teach a higher grade level, and in a different part of the country.)

I recognize the signs of burnout and the uselessness of yet another PD (professional development) day. Few of those ever prove helpful because they weren't practical, or because they espoused methods or technology that never got put into practice, or whatever.

The suggestions found in these pages (as opposed to any library of random PD binders) will be more helpful to any new teacher and maybe the experienced ones as well. You're not alone -- there are others around you for support, and they're going through the same things.

---

Nothing to add. I requested this book because it was a memoir, which is on my 2016 reading list, and because it was about teaching. And it was short. Sad to say, I'm picking a lot of shorter books that aren't in series.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Ghost of the Dawnlands: A Tale of the Skadegamutc (Waters)

Ghost of the Dawnlands: A Tale of the Skadegamutc
by Robert E. Waters, J.W. Harp (Illustrator) (2025)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a free Advanced Reader Copy from Library Thing. I'm encouraged (but not required) to leave reviews in exchange for the free books.

I left the following review on the Library Thing website:

A Skadegamutc is a "ghost-witch" from Wabanaki mythology. In 1988, a sorceror from the Penobscot tribe defied death to become a ball of light. The creature takes the form of a sort of vampire/zombie to feed, and that's how it appeared when Joe Littlecloud and Horus Ruth of the VPA (Violent Paranormal Activity) department of the FBI corenered it, and almost killed it. But it played with the men's memories long enough to injure Ruth and then escape.

Littlecloud realizes that he needs to call Chimalis Burton, a FBI-VPA agent in Colorado who has a special, cermonial knife. Burton is currently on adminstrative leave while the FBI investigates the killings of federal agents while she pursued a different cryptid in Alaska, but she's cleared to assist Littlecloud in Maine.

And then the hunt is on, taking them through Maine and New Brunswick, to hunt down and corner the ghost-witch, all the while hampered by bad information being fed to them by an agent who is under the influence of the skadegamutc.

There were a few twists that I didn't expect, along with mentions of previous cases that I assume are in earlier books that I'll have to look for, ending with a satisfying conclusion.

I enjoyed this book.

---

My first impression was that Littlecloud and Ruth were characters from a previous book and that Burton was a character from a different book, and that this was an ultimate crossover. The descriptions online only mention Burton, so this is her book, even though she's the last major character to be introduced.

Spoiler-y stuff: the book is also an ending for some characters as well as the ceremonial knife, which may or may not be repaired in the future.

I did wonder how they were going to kill it when it could mess with their minds the way that it did. They had to get it at a weak moment, of course. I just didn't want for something that didn't work before to work now, because the timing was better. Also, the knife gets removed from the equation, even though it's the main reason that Burton was brought in.

One comment, which I probably should relate to eSpec, is that FBI-VPA is never defined in the book itself. I had to Google it.

Since it's only a novella, it was a pretty quick read.

I now own seven of these books -- 1 paper, 6 electronic -- but I've only read the last two. At least, the paperback is signed.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

In Utero (Gooch)

In Utero
Written by Chris Gooch (2024)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This past fall, I started looking for more standalone graphic novels at the library, both to read and to find examples of artwork that I could show in my Graphic Novel class.

Looking at covers and looking for anything different, I saw the cover of In Utero. Looked interesting. For a moment, I thought the book was going to be in 3-D and that I would need special glasses for it, but a quick flip of the pages informed me otherwise.

In Utero is an Australian YA graphic novel. It purportedly blends coming-of-age, sci-fi, and horror.

There's a bizarre setup where a young girl, Hailey, is dropped off at a day care program which is situated inside a deserted, run-down mall. Years earlier, there had been an "incident" in Australia, and the mall has been closed for a long time. Hailey wanders off when she meets an older teen, Jen, who isn't what she seems to be. They explored the mall, down to a flooded parking level where there is a giant egg. Jen is actually the egg, or rather, a projection of what is growing inside the egg.

At the same time, other kids have explored and found some odd kind of life forms that react to the them, much like a toy or a puppy might. When these things are discovered, Hazmat teams arrive to check all the children and staff, and to gather up the specimens. They make two mistakes: first, putting all the creatures together, and second, thinking that the canisters will contain whatever happens when there's a critical mass of these creatures.

A giant monster forms and starts looking for Jen, while authorities are looking for Hailey as well. It's up to Haily to save Jen and everyone else.

The book was mildly horrific, since it's YA. It had an interesting color palette, being mostly shades of blue, except for when it was primarily red.

It wasn't the greatest thing, or even overly enjoyable, but I was happy to read it. It was definitely something else. And I think I took a few photos of pages that I might be able to use next year if they give me the same class again.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Nothing to See Here (Wilson)

Nothing to See Here
Kevin Wilson (2022)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a Pandemic Book Club selection. Or an Alternate. I listened to it before the final selection was made. I was the one picking the books this month.

I enjoyed this book and plan on reading it whenever it becomes available at the library, whether or not it is selected for the Book Club.

A little background: A while back, I posted an image I saw online showing postage-stamp sized covers for "the best books on Good Reads for the past 10 yeasr".

It was suggested that I select three of them for my picks for the book club. Ugh.

As it turns out, the image was bogus. It was nowhere to be found on Good Reads, nor was there any sort of page with this information. What I did find was the best books, by genre, voted on by the readers, and lists of the Top 200 books, by rating I believe, for each of those years.

Each year had 8 thumbnails in the image. As best as I could tell, four of these were fiction and four were historical fiction. Those were the only two categories. It wasn't the top book from eight different categories. Worse, sometimes the top book wasn't even one of the eight images. And still worse, three of the 80 books weren't even in the top ten of either genre or top 200 of the year.

Actually, it might've been four, but there were three books in particular that I was unable to identify. The images weren't clear enough to read a title and I couldn't find matching covers. It is possible that it was an alternate cover, which happened in at least one other case.

Getting back to my picks: I devised a scheme in a spreadsheet, using the Good Reads rating and the page count. After Copperhead, I was determined not to have anything over 500 pages, and anything over, say, 350 better by damn good AND interesting to me. Keep in mind, nothing here is genre fiction. Also of most, I checked availability at the three area libraries.

Most of the historical stuff fell into disfavor because the most popular books of the year are going to hit the same time periods. I'd sooner find another Cold Sassy Tree! And a lot of the general fiction hit a lot of the same themes. Now, some of them might've been interesting from their descriptions, and I'd read them IF one of the OTHER members of the club picked them. But they weren't going to be MY picks.

That's brings us to Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson. It was always going to be my number one pick, even as I struggled to find numbers 2 and 3.

A woman is hired to take care of a couple of twins that have a problem that they suddenly will burst into flames. Did I need more than that? I got my genre fiction. And it wasn't a horror book. It's not Firestarter, not Stephen King.

Lillian becomes the caretaker for her estranged friend Madison's two stepchildren, who spontaneously combust when agitated. It's a sticky situation. And the two friends have a strained history of their own.

We learn that Lillian who grew up poor and with a mother who didn't care about much of anything, got a scholarship to private high school. Madison is her roommate who instantly takes to Lillian because she's real, not someone pretending to be something, not another snooty rich person (like Madison herself, although she isn't snooty about it then). Rich kids can usually get away with anything. It won't matter because they all have rich parents. However, near the end of the year, drugs are found in Madison's room, and for once, the school is going to make an example out of her for all the other rich kids to see.

Madison's father doesn't want her daughter's life opportunites (not career opportunites, mind you) to be ruined, so he offers Lillian's mother $10,000 for Lillian to take the fall. Instead of being more lenient on the poor girl, the school kicks her out. She goes back to public school as a failure with a reputation, and no one expects anything to become of her, nor do the go out of their way to make her life better. She's a screwup. And the "college fund", of course, disappeared long before she got to college.

Flash foward a bunch of years, Madison is married to a Senator and living in Atlanta. She's been pen pals with Lillian the entire time. She calls Lillian with an opportunity to look after her two stepchildren whose mother passed away. There's just one little catch -- the children catch fire. Their clothes get singed but they're otherwise fine.

It takes time for the kids to trust her and start to do breathing exercises. They move into a guest house behind the Senator's mansion in Atlanta where they all start to grow on each other, except for Carl, who is an aide to the senator and her liaison.

Lillian does a bit of growing herself and loves and protects the kids. If I had a complaint about this book is that the story is too short -- I know, I can't believe I'm saying this. What I mean is that when would should be a big twist happens, the fallout isn't quite what it should be. Keep in mind, the title of the book is "Nothing to See Here" because stuff like this gets covered up in politics if you're rich, know enough people, and can exchange favors.

And yet, you'd think that the author would've turned up the temperature a little more. But I guess it had to be kept to a manageable, "cover-uppable" level.

I enjoyed this audiobook and reccommend it.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Fox Maidens (Ha)

The Fox Maidens
Written by Robin Ha (2024)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This past fall, I started looking for more standalone graphic novels at the library, both to read and to find examples of artwork that I could show in my Graphic Novel class.

Looking at covers and looking for anything different, I saw the cover of The Fox Maidens. Looked interesting so I borrowed it.

The book opens with a brief lesson about The Joseon Dynasty, which ruled Korea for about 500 years, ending in the early 20th century. It also introduces the main characters and their class or station.

The story follows a young woman named Kai who dreams of being a warrior and who has been trained by her father. Her father remembers when his sisters were killed as children and were unable to defend themselves, so he allows her to train. Some question this but he runs the school. Kai's father also rose in his station by killing Gumiho, the nine-tailed fox demon, but others remember his more humble beginnings (think "new money" vs "old money").

Kai's mother was taken away as a child and brought far away work in the woods by men who are afraid of the fox demon, but know that she doesn't harm children. Kai's mother get sick and is discarded, but Gumiho rescues her. Years later, she betrays Gumiho after the fox demon raids towns now that the wards have been removed. Kai's father rescues her and kills Gumiho -- or at least believes that he did.

Kai's mother is barren, but Gumiho (who still lives) tells her that she can make it so that she can have one child, a girl. That girl, Kai, would become a fox maiden when she has her first moonblood.

Kai and her mother have to deal with this, neither wanting to worry the other. The secret gets out, and her father believes that Kai must've been killed years earlier and Gumiho took her place. He sets off to kill her again.

The story gets resolved but the ending is a bit rushed with a side character returning who was also in Kai's debt since she was a child. This one had a hard life and made bad choices, but they were the only choices she had.

Here is where the "queer" portion of the description of the book comes into play. Honestly, it just feels tacked on. I didn't find Kai any more "queer" than any other female heroine that didn't want to continue with the assigned gender roles of the time. Not until the two women get together at the end, at any rate. Nothing wrong with it, but I guess I just think that it could've been worked into the story better.

At any rate, I can't think of any other Korean stories I've read other than the following two: The Fox's Fire, by Danielle Ackley-McPhail (an American writer and my sometimes editor/publisher) contains a story with Gumiho in it, and I read a story about one man's escape from North Korea, which is an entirely different kind of story (and also nonfiction).

Next graphic novel, which I picked up at the same time, will be set in Australia. And I have more Book Club and Library Thing books to start.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

The Secret Winners Club (2026)

The Secret Winners Club
by Donna Galanti (2026)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a free Advanced Reader Copy from Library Thing. I'm encouraged (but not required) to leave reviews in exchange for the free books.

I left the following review on the Library Thing website:

"Don't talk about Secret Winners Club" isn't the first rule of Secret Winners Club, but it's up there on the list.

Three middle-school students with autoimmune disorders (one is hairless, one has psoriasis, one had developed spots) join together for support each other, and to help each win, whatever it takes. Vee wants to beat her classmate swimming the IM 200 and break a school record. Sunny wants to build a winning junkbot and beat a rival student

The first thing they decide to do is find experts and get their advice and help. This starts off well, but then doing whatever it takes to win, or wanting to win for the wrong reasons, takes a toll in the way they act toward both their mentors and their classmates.

There are more complications when Trevor's absent father returns, and when new club member Jolie has her own health issues.

They learn that everyone has their own problems that they're dealing with even if it isn't as obvious, and winning doesn't mean you get to be the bully.

I enjoyed this book.

---

There isn't much more to add. Suspension of disbelief that these three students have these particular autoimmune diseases in the same small middle school. And then the fourth has anxiety, although she tries to claima disease to fit in.

Sunny's mom left when she was young, as did Trevor's dad. Sunny wants to win so she can be in the newspaper and maybe her mother will see it and be sorry that she left them. Not that she wants her back. Trevor hates that his father came back, which increases his anxiety levels, which can worsen his condition.

Vee is the first winner, and she becomes what she hates, and then doesn't feel good about it.

Nothing hits you over the head, not even Trev's infatuation for another boy whom he doesn't know if he's also gay or not.

The book avoids a bunch of tropes and could've gone off the rails or gotten preachy in places.

It was a quick read.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Demon Copperhead (Kingsolver)

Demon Copperhead
Barbara Kingsolver (2022)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a Pandemic Book Club selection.

I realize that this book won a Pulitzer Prize, so my opinions don't matter much, except to me.

This book was long. Too long. Longer than it needed to be.

I listened to all 21 hours of it (and I listened to the first couple of chapters twice, like I tend to do). Despite not starting the book until I was nearly done with the audio, it will still a job to plow through it. I was reading, reading, reading, and still at 4% ... more reading ... 12%.

I made the mistake of mentioning this on the group chat about how far I'd gotten, and the moderator voted to push the meeting back two weeks. I can't make the meeting on that day. After another day or two of reading, I asked myself, why am I torturing myself. I have other things to read.

A couple of things to note:

First, I've never read David Copperfield, nor have I ever seen any kind of dramaticization. Second, I didn't even realize when the book was chosen that this was a modern retelling of it (side note: getting a little sick of those -- couldn't this Pulitzer Prize winner do something original). With a title like Demon Copperhead, I expected more horror in this version -- granted, we read two books by Brom.

The main character's name is Damon, but he gets called Demon. He's born in white trash and live a white-trash life. Any time things start to get better, they get smashed down again. And this roller coaster goes on and on, until it doesn't. Then it's over. The book could've been 100-200 pages shorter and it wouldn't have hurt the narrative. It reads like the novelization of a five-year TV series -- and by that I mean the old 20-24 episode seasons, not the current 8-10 episodes.

But was the ending worth the long ride? Again, no.

Also, there were a couple of tropes that I see often, which annoy me. One, the hero has nothing, finally gets something, gets to make one purchase in one scene, and then he's robbed of everything and left with nothing again. Recent examples of this were in the TV show "1923" and in the beginning of the book, "Kings of the Wyld". Now that I think of it, it reminds me of those old AD&D computer games, where you finish one game and move to the next where you're immediately stripped of all your possessions and start off with nothing again. Hey, if you can succeed once, you can again, right? Still, Damon could've had that bankroll for a little more than a couple pages.

A second one happens later in the book when his girlfriend gets pregnant, and Damon thinks that this will change things for the better. Within a few pages, she loses the baby after barely making a blip on the story. If this was a nonfiction book, that might be something. Here, just another way to take something away from Damon -- like when his mother was pregnant when she died.

So, basically, not a fan.

Final note: if I write another story set in some plane in the underworld, I'll be sure to add a "demon copperhead" that's at least 2 to 3 times the size that it needs to be.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Cooking with Monsters: The Beginner's Guide to Culinary Combat (Alsaqa/Truong)

Cooking with Monsters (Book One):
The Beginner's Guide to Culinary Combat
Written by Jordan Alsaqa and Illustrated by Vivian Truong (2023)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This past fall, I started looking for more standalone graphic novels at the library, both to read and to find examples of artwork that I could show in my Graphic Novel class. On a recent visit, I found this book and the title and cover sold me.

Imagine My Hero Academia, but it's a Cooking school for Warrior Chefs, Gourmand Academy of Culinary Combat. It looks like it could be a cartoon, but it isn't. Also, it's not manga, but definitely inspired by them. It's read from left to right, starting with the traditional front page for this country.

The world of the book is the country of Gourmand, and it's capital Gourmand City. And there's an archipalego that's full of different cultures.

The book opens with a young Hana Ozawa and Bobby Binh hunting a monster outside their village. They are overwhelmed but saved by a Warrior Chef, who slays the monster and fries it up in a pan (not really, but does prepare a meal from the meat). I forget the characters' names already, and there isn't much to go on online.

Flash forward a few years and the two characters are at Gourmand City to attend a Hogwarts type school for Culinary Arts. Students will train with Warrior Chefs, including the one we saw earlier. And here's where the drama/melodrama starts.

A broody/annoying girl named Olivia immediately is ticked off with with Hana for nothing that Hana did. It's all Olivia's baggage, but it drives a wedge between her and her classmates/friends and none of them seems to want to do or say anything about it, and basically treat them equally at fault. High school stuff where everything is blown out of proportion.

Add in a bit of "checklist fiction" to make sure that everyone is represented but it doesn't overwhelem the story (by becoming the story). In fact, I didn't see this description (not a review, mind you, but the capsule summary) until after I'd read the book:

Cooking with Monsters is Naruto with a cast of LGBTQ+ characters. It’s Percy Jackson or Harry Potter without a straight white man in the pilot seat.

Had I seen that, I might've skipped it because books that find this to be the topmost quality to promote about the book rather than its story tend to be, in my opinion, lacking on story. (Anger is a Gift comes to mind.)

There appears to be a love triangle forming, which while tired are pretty much standard in teen dramas, but this one will be determined by whether one of the three is straight or gay, unless they become bi. Again, in books that classify themselves as "queer", this sort of thing is more "fluid" than it appears to be in any high school I've actually taught at, not that I know anyone's leaning unless they put it out there for everyone to see. (And many, again, in my limited experience, prefer to be private about their feelings.)

Getting back to the book, I liked the artwork, although I used a couple of panels in my Graphic Novel class for both good and bad examples. The monsters were silly and dangerous enough with names reminiscent of Pokemon puns. The training and the fights, while no "My Hero Academia", were entertaining. I might watch an episode or two if it were a cartoon, but I don't think I'll read another book in the series.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Fantastic Tales of Steampunk (Lyman)

Fantastic Tales of Steampunk
by Jeffrey Lyman (2025)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a free Advanced Reader Copy from Library Thing. I'm encouraged (but not required) to leave reviews in exchange for the free books.

Also of note: I have been published by eSpec Books, which also published this book. Final note: I've had a copy of "The Troll King" for a couple of years, having earned it as a bonus story for some eSpec Kickstarter event. I hadn't read it yet mostly because of its size -- I've been reading all those stories in older of size in my computer folder directory.

I left the following review on the Library Thing website:

Fantastic Tales of Steampunk has five great stories. The stories range wide from creating bridges to other places to ships locked in ice and wary of sea monsters to a photographer taking photos for a police investigation aboard a dirigible that flew through the Harrow.

My favorites were "The Troll King" and "The Ring of Hours and Seconds" . The Troll King is protected by steampunk armor and has an army of similarly suited ogres. Forty-eight young men of the kingdoms must survive three challenges against ogres taking place on land, in the air, and underwater. Few are expected to survive, but ogres can be beaten. The question becomes, can the Troll King be beaten as well?

The Ring of Hours and Seconds is owned by a necromancer and must be stolen by Toten to pay off his girl's gambling debts. The necromancer makes a counter-offer, asking Toten to take on a different challenge, which could clear the debt if successful, or possibly kill him.

A nice, varied collection of stories showing what steampunk can do. Great for readers new to steampunk.

Other notes:

The first story with the bridges was a little confusing to me at first, but it picked up. The Troll King was definitely the winner with its Hunger Games vibes -- I left that out of the LT review on purpose. The arctic story was a nice change of scenery. I can't think of two many stories set in a similar location. I didn't follow the Camera story as well, but there are ghost in the blimp remaining from the Harrow, which in itself is an interesting concept.

The necromancer story has a great setup with airships taking people to different skyscrapers.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

The Rom-Commers (Center)

The Rom-Commers
Katherine Center (2024)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a Pandemic Book Club selection.

This has to be a trope in itself: a rom com about two writers writing a rom com. Not that I would know because I don't typically read the genre unless I'm forced to, such as by a book club. It had the right length because my problem with books or movies of this type is that everything has to build to that last moment, and sometimes that last moment takes an agonizing amount of time to get to, and not in a good way. Yes, there were still points where I made've said, oh cmon already, but the groundwork for the excuses and delays were there, so as long as those excusde had a payoff (that is, a reasonable explanation, and I mean reasonable in their own universe), I was good with that.

Two side notes: I recall one Harry Potter book were quite a few people I knew were saying, "why doesn't he just talk to Dumblebdore already???!!!". And more recently, I was covering the topic of "The Hero's Journey" for my graphic novel class, both the 17-point and 12-point versions. It did show me what I was missing in my own writing. Also, it's said that Lucas used this theory to plot out the original Star Wars. If I checked, I bet Raiders of the Lost Ark would fit as well ... except for the opening scene.

Continuing...

Emma Wheeler gets a call for a dream job to ghost write a screenplay for a screenwriting legend Charlie Yates. Charlie's manager, Logan, was Emma's boyfriend in high school but then went away to college and then came out as gay. This confused me at first, until I realized that he wasn't supposed to be the other half of the rom com couple. As I said, I don't read these things. The love interest hadn't been introduced yet.

Emma puts her life on hold, as does her younger sister and ill father, and flies to California only to find that there's no job. Charlie Yates isn't interested in a ghost writer. One thing leads to another and Emma ends up staying one night. While she's there, Charlie inquires why she thought his screenplay (for a updated remake of It Happened One Night) was "apolyptically" bad. (They use a worse word.) He agrees to hire her for a consulation. To her surprise, he takes a lot of notes. And then he spends the night reading her scripts.

By the morning, when she's calling an Uber, Charlie's trying to convince Emma to stay. However, Emma knows what Charlie really thinks about her and has no interest in staying, especially if it's just to make the screenplay "passable" instead of doing it right. Charlie knows that the screenplay won't get made, but he needs to write it for a big wig producer's mistress (who wants to star in it), so the big wig will produce his Mafia movie.

Charlie gives in and says he'll do it right.

Antics ensue, especially after Emma overhears Charlie telling Logan that he'll go back on the deal once he get the script passable and be done with it. Emma stays because she needs the money and because she thinks she can change Charlie's mnd about rom-coms.

Through it alll, he hear about everyone's tradegies and traumas, which left Emma yearning for more and Charlie cynical as hell.

In the end, it all comes together ... until it all falls apart ... but then there's a chance ... but, no, not gonna happen ... okay, fine! Fine! Have it your way! ... oops gotta go ... okay, I'll follow ...

And then it comes to the prescribed happy ending that we've been assured that all good rom-coms have because their viewers (and by extension their readers) have expectations that must be fulfilled or else it isn't a rom com.

I enjoyed the book and was happy that it read fast. It wasn't "spicy" or "sexy", which are buzzwords that I've seen, because everything is delayed until the end.

If there was any problem, it was the extended epilogue that even my kindle suggested skipping, but I kept with it. I skipped the preview of the next book, which is about a cruise ship wedding and being stuck onboard.

I started the book on audio until the ebook became available. About two-thirds of the way through, the ebook overtook the audio. But I kept listening to the audio in case I missed anything.

As of this writing, the book club hasn't met yet. It meets on Friday.

My Hero Academia Volume 41 and 42

My Hero Academia Volume 41, by Kōhei Horikoshi (2025) My Hero Academia Volume 41, by Kōhei Horikoshi (2025)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

Somehow, I never posted a review for Volume 41, so I'll comment on what I remember about it.

It's just as well that I cover both volumes at the same time because, in reality, the story ended in volume 41, and all that's left is to pick up the pieces.

SPOILERS -- Because there's just no other way.

In 41, Bakugo stands up to the rejuventated All-for-One, which makes sense because Bakugo has been a protagonist alongside Deku the whole ride. There are two major villains and he should be get to deal with one of them. It's at this point that you realize that All for One is not the bigger of the two threats even as he's been pulling the strings with Tomura Shigaraki. And then there's the fact that there's a mental connection between the two, which makes them something of a hybrid individual.

Seeing Bakugo taking on All For One after getting messed up royally by Shigaraki is absolutely heroic.

Deku's fight with Shigaraki takes a weird twist in 41. He gives up One for All to Shigaraki, knowing (guessing, really) that Shigaraki's body can't handle it, the same way that Deku couldn't at first.

So in the matchup at the very beginning of volume 42, the story is already over. Deku finally realizes that that little boy that he wanted to save is beyond saving. He gives him a punch that sends Shigaraki into eternity, now that he's powers, including his healing, aren't working.

And that's it. Story over.

Almost the entire volume is epilogue.

We see Class 1A become 2A. We see Aoyama leave the school voluntarily, making room for Shinso to join class 2A. New kids come in, idolozing the Class 2. We see Kota being aged up to being only a year younger than Deku (instead of probably 6 years younger), just so he can be there. (The author acknoledges this.)

And then everything jumps to 8 years later. Crime is down. There's less work for heros, but they still exist and have agencies. Deku is teaching. Bakugo has his own agency.

We get to see new hero rankings, which include most of the former 1A and 1B. A few people have relationships. They all meet for dinner, but, of course, it's interrupted. And finally, it's up to Bakugo, of all people, to give Deku relationship advice, and Deku finally goes after Ochaco. And it's a wrap on the series.

It was a fun ride while it lasted, and I hope there are more side projects where we get to see these kids as actual heroes, even if Deku has only embers of All for One remaining.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Mount Misery (Chambers)

Mount Misery
Systema Paradoxa #28
by James Chambers (2026)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a free Advanced Reader Copy from Library Thing. I'm encouraged (but not required) to leave reviews in exchange for the free books.

Also of note: I have been published by eSpec Books, which also published this book.

Systema Paradoxa is a series of Cryptid books, each with a new take on a different monster. I own about a half-dozen (one is a signed printed book and the rest are ebooks), and this is the first one I've read. Each book stands alone, and there's a series of writers. This book did reference previous encounters by the main characters, but the previous books, whichever ones they were, were not required reading.

I left the following review on the Library Thing website:

Anyone who has ever driven on Long Island, particularly at night, will get weird feelings that strange things are happening around them. This tale brings that to life, adding Mothman, Men in Black and a mystery needing to be unraveled.

Ben Keep and Annetta Maikels know that reality isn't what it appears to be. They investigate the paranormal and find it difficult to turn down a request for help, especially when the paranormal come asking for help in their own unusual way.

It's a fun ride, much more fund than actually driving along the Southern State or Ocean Parkway.

This book, which is part of a series of Cryptid tales, is a standalone story. Some references are made to earlier stories, but you don't need to read those first.

---

More of a breakdown of the stories, which doesn't belong on Library Thing:

Actually, I don't have much to add, so I'll start with something from eSpec:

Cryptid investigators, Ben Keep and Annetta Maikels, left "normal" behind a long time ago. They've peeked behind the curtains of existence, glimpsed beneath the weft and weave of accepted reality.

Ben and Annetta investigate the paranormal, especially when they come asking for help. There are references to past cases, and I imagine that these deal with previous entries written by Chambers for this series. These didn't bother me, I took them in stride. Then there was a call from a character who'd previously disappeared. He's warning Ben about this case. I don't know who that is and I had no attachment to him even though he should've been important. He was important to Ben.

The only other thing that stood out was that large portions of the text were in transcript format, as Ben and Annetta were interviewing witnesses. Scenes like this are great for TV, but I'm less fond of them in print. It makes it feel like I'm reading a script.

I enjoyed this novella. I have more in this series to read.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Random Short Stories and Novellas (2024 - 2026)

Random Short Stories

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

• "Pleasing the Queen" by Selina Coffey, 2015. (read July 2024)
  I needed something to listen to when walking and this was only an hour long. I originally thought I'd listen to it twice because I always have trouble getting into things and because my mind wanders when I walk. Yeah. When it got to the adult content, I had second thoughts about it. Actually, the thing that really got to me was the terrible AI voice doing the reading, devoid of all emotion, including during the sex scenes. The bot also can't handle dialogue with short sentences between the two parties. It was hard (so to speak) to keep track of who was saying what. Weirdest was the end when the voice switched to make to thank the listener -- the book takes on a new perspective if a man was writing those scenes. But, no, the author is female. Anyway, I downloaded the short story (novella, actually) to read. I skipped the preview.
  It was okay. Nothing special. But reading it was better than listening to that bot. Fully the last 20% of the download was a preview of a book. The entire denouement featured a wedding following by detailed descriptions of their love making after the plot had been resolved. The plot: the new Queen arises to power when her parents are killed. Her older sister is already the wife of a Elven lord. Her councilors all agree on a single candidate for her spouse (totally political in nature as these things are), and that Lord tries to work spells on the Queen to make her desire him. She rebuffs that and does the nasty with an old friend instead who helps save the kingdom.
• "Sweet Maiden" by Ginney Patrick, 2023. (read July 2025)
  This was a booklet that I picked up at World Fantasy Con in Niagara Falls, NY, 2024. Ginny Patrick is the pen name of Virginia Smith.
  Carin MacIntyre is the daughter of the cook of Lord Rimple. On her eighth birthday, he takes a walk in the wood where a unicorn finds her. The unicorn asks her to come away with her, but she can't because it would hurt her mother. The unicorn promises to come again and take her when she's ready. Life takes twists and turns by her seventeenth birthday, when Strathofire is repulsed by how she's changed. Would this be the last time she'd ever see him?
  It was a cute story. The story was about 22 pamphlet-sized pages.
• "A Conspiracy of One" by Leonard & Ann Marie Wilson, 2020 (read July 2025)
  Dark Goddess Chronicles, 28 pages, stapled. I'll call this one a novella, not a short story.
  This was a booklet that I picked up at World Fantasy Con in Niagara Falls, NY 2024. The DGC are fairy-tale themed, inspired by them in a "ripped from the headlines" television show is inspired by real-world events.
  The conspiracy involves the assassination of the queen, which is witnessed by her body double/lookalike/decoy. She has to escape, which she does with the help of alternate personalities, who may or may not be other people (including a young girl and a panther) and who gather in a court that may or may not exist solely in her head. Jenilee escapes by pretending to be the queen, and so she ends up at a party that the queen had been invited to, only to find that everyone is shocked to see that the queen is still alive. Now, she has to escape again.

• "Mud and Brass" by Andrew Knighton, 2014 (read June 2025?, possibly sooner)
  I don't know when I read this. I'd forgotten about it until I was cleaning books I'd already read from my phone. (I leave them on my iPad, usually.) I vaguely remember downloading it. (I just checked my email and saw that it was April 2025.) I probably read it not long after that.
  Good Reads lists this as 26 pages, so I'll call it a novella.
  I honestly couldn't remember much about the story until I saw this description on Good Reads: How far would you go for love, or for justice, or for the perfect gearwheel? Thomas Niggle grew up a mudlark, hunting for scrap on the polluted banks of the River Burr. One of the countless poor living in the shadows of Mercer Shackleton’s vast factories, he has dragged himself out of poverty using his mechanical skills. An encounter with Gloria Shackleton, the Mercer’s daughter, offers Niggle the possibility of love, but it also offers something else, deep in the heart of the Mercer’s domain. What hope can the future hold for a boy raised amidst the mud and brass? A steampunk story of romance, vengeance and twisted technology.

  So, basically, a story of haves and have nots mixed with a love story and a tale of revenge, as a mud person takes on a technocrat.
  Again, I don't remember much, but I didn't hate it. I'd remember that. So it was an okay story.
  As with most steampunk, unless it's written by someone I know, it's likely I read it because I want to know how to write steampunk stories, preferrably a good one.

*********
• "Mud and Brass" by Andrew Knighton, 2014 (read June 2025?, possibly sooner)
  I don't know when I read this. I'd forgotten about it until I was cleaning books I'd already read from my phone. (I leave them on my iPad, usually.) I vaguely remember downloading it. (I just checked my email and saw that it was April 2025.) I probably read it not long after that.
  Good Reads lists this as 26 pages, so I'll call it a novella.
  I honestly couldn't remember much about the story until I saw this description on Good Reads: How far would you go for love, or for justice, or for the perfect gearwheel? Thomas Niggle grew up a mudlark, hunting for scrap on the polluted banks of the River Burr. One of the countless poor living in the shadows of Mercer Shackleton’s vast factories, he has dragged himself out of poverty using his mechanical skills. An encounter with Gloria Shackleton, the Mercer’s daughter, offers Niggle the possibility of love, but it also offers something else, deep in the heart of the Mercer’s domain. What hope can the future hold for a boy raised amidst the mud and brass? A steampunk story of romance, vengeance and twisted technology.

  So, basically, a story of haves and have nots mixed with a love story and a tale of revenge, as a mud person takes on a technocrat.
  Again, I don't remember much, but I didn't hate it. I'd remember that. So it was an okay story.
  As with most steampunk, unless it's written by someone I know, it's likely I read it because I want to know how to write steampunk stories, preferrably a good one.

*********
• "The Chief's Boss" by E. Chris Ambrose, 2019 (read February 2026)
  This was a little booklet that I picked up at a convention, probably from World Fantasy Con in 2024 or Phil Con 2024. This booklet was at school, and I think it was with a pile that had been in a locker in summer 2025, so it's probably not from Reader Con in Boston or Phil Con 2025.
  The booklet is basically a short story over 28 pages, probably around 4,000 - 5,000 words. It's billed as "A Bone Guard Adventure", not that I knew what that was. Having read it, I'd say it's likely a prequel to the three books advertised in the back (two out, one coming soon, as of 2019).
  It's a quick, little story about a rescue in Afghanistan in 2003. A female scientist has been captured by al Qaeda and the spec ops Goon Squad is going to go in to rescue her and take out everyone else. Grant Casey is the new kid on the team with a plan to ride in and see if she's still alive and if she can possibly rescue her before the rest of the team attacks.
  The Sarge, Gonsalves, calls Grant "Chief" because he's native. This confused me at first. He's not native American, he's from the area, which is why he's able to approach the al Qaeda hideout on horseback. I didn't get the connection with "Chief" if there is one.

  I'm not advertising, but since this story isn't on Good Reads, and a search for "Bone Guard" gave me wildly unconnected results, I'll list the website in case I want to check this out. (Odds are that I'll pass along the booklet in a Little Free Library.) It's BoneGuardBooks.com
  A quick check shows: there are 7 books, the website redirects to a different publisher, and the little twitter account for Ambrose doesn't exist. I honestly only went looking because I wanted to copy one of the logos or find an image of the cover of this story. I'm not scouring social media if he gave up on Twitter and his publisher couldn't bother to update.




If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. The fourth book will be available by the time you see this!

The Axolotl Familiar

The Axolotl Familiar
Written and illustrated by KuroKoneko Kamen
(2025)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

I looked on Amazon for free graphic novel that I might use in my Graphic Novel class -- either to assign because they're free or to grab a screenshot or two for presentations. This book popped up. I was a little worried by the cover. Having no knowledge of this book, I didn't know if it might get explicit or exploitive. That was not an issue.

The bigger issue was that this was just bad. Sad, even, not for the story, but for the presentation.

As I posted on social media about a quarter way through the book, some days I can read stories set in undersea castles where witches mix potions and their familiars read paper books, and others when I wonder what the hell am I reading?

That's the case here. And don't let me forget the fire spells.

Some of this is addressed later on, when Axol is trying to reach the surface because he wants to see the sea of stars and the rabbit on the moon. Serina tells him that he wouldn't be able to breathe the air up there like merfolk can. He is able to breathe in school (Selina is 14) because of enchantments. Likewise, there is one class in school where there is no water and the students (merfolk) all sit on bubbles because there need to be able to take notes and the teacher needs to be able to write on the chalkboard.

So it's implied that there are no such enchantments at the castle and it's filled with sea water.

This comic is based on a novella (by the author) and is meant to be three issues long. The novella might be a better read without the visuals, which are the biggest problem.

Many pages only have one or two images on them, and it seems like every image is vying to be the cover, which isn't the way you want to illustrate a comic. The title character, Axol, appears to have a single pose with slight variations. He's always facing forward (or almost forward) looking straight ahead (or just slightly off-center) even if the character he is speaking to is next to or behind him. Many of the other characters have similar issues with their eyes and where they're facing and looking.

Axol also has a size issue, where he's small enough to fit in a bird cage with disappearing bars that sometimes appear so close together that you wonder how he squeezed his head through. And if his head can squeeze through, why can't the rest of him?

Let's just say that despite the merits of any one individual panel, the artwork was incredibly distracting and laughable.

I don't think I'll look for the second part of it.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Hollow

Hollow
Written by Shannon Watters and Branden Boyer-White,
Illustrated by Berenice Nelle (2022)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This past fall, I started looking for more standalone graphic novels at the library, both to read and to find examples of artwork that I could show in my Graphic Novel class. This was a hardcover that wasn't part of a series. Three teens on the cover in the dark in the woods, with the word "Hollow" as the title. I'm not sure when I notice the bright orange pumpkin or the dark figure holding it. (To be fair, the lighting in that section of the library isn't great.

Anyway, it's obviously a take on Sleepy Hollow, and from the clothes you can see that it's a modern take. Thankfully, it's not a modern retelling where the original tale never took place (but everything else in the world is the same). Aside from that ...

The story was okay, but the artwork was problematic. I spent too much time noticing it and looking at it for the wrong reasons.

This book has sat in a TBR pile for months because I hadn't gotten to read the book on top of it. (Straight on Till Morning) I read this is a day. (Free read Friday helped, as did two subway rides.) Had I not been so quick to read it, I might've taken another look at the cover, where you'll notice the central character has full lips that are a little glossy and what appears to be an earring or stud on her lobe.

This might've helped because for the first portion of the book, despite being told that Izzy Crane is Isabel Crane, she looked like a boy. No one else (character-wise) seemed to think she was a boy. The only confusion was mine. It was a good chunk of the book before her jacket became a longer coat.

Basically, it seemed to me, and I could be way off-base especially now that I know the writer also wrote Lumberjanes, but it seemed like the story was originally written for Izzy to be male, and then switched a queer romance. Aside from how she's drawn, there are other little bits that seem odd. For example, when Izzy's mother asks if Izzy has met anyone at her new school, Izzy replies that there's one good who's kind of cool.

Mom gets excited and says, "A GIRL?" and automatically assumes that there's a spark of a romance to be had. Why would mom assume that when her daughter makes friends with a girl that there might be some romantic spark going on? (I never had my mother ask "A BOY?" when I made a friend in school.) And Izzy said the girl was cool, not possibly gay, particularly since she hasn't gotten to know her yet.

Isabel's image aside (and it did change subtly throughout the book so that at times she appeared more feminine), my bigger concern was how the artwork changed styles. In one panel, we're close-up and can see the whites of their eyes and even the shapes of their eyes, and in the next, everyone has two dots for eyes and maybe a nose but not necessarily. The abrupt shift back and forth was confusing. It felt like there were two different artists at work some times. It was a major distraction.

There were times when I wasn't sure that the third character, who had to be Croc, was actually him or someone new.

The story is that Sleepy Hollow loves celebrating its legend. One person who doesn't in Vicky Van Tassel, who is a descendant of the original woman from Irving's story (which is fictional but based on real events). She hates being used because she's a Van Tassel. When Izzy first shows up, she wants nothing to do with her because her last name is Crane. Too much.

Meanwhile the horseman has been appearing again. When it chases Izzy (who doesn't believe in this nonsense until then), she learns that it's appearing to protect Vicky from all threats, and this Hallloween is a "dark Halloween" when the threat is likely to appear.

Also there's a new substitute teacher named Mr. Tenebrous, which is defined as dark, shadowy, or obscure. I mean, it's obvious he's evil but does it have to be that obvious? Well, it's a Buffy/Scooby Doo type story, so I guess it does. In any case, Tenebrous is an evil spirit who has cursed the Van Tassel family from the time of the original story.

One final quibble which they acknowledge in the story: Katrina Van Tassel married Brom Bones, aka Brom Van Brunt. So their children would've had the family name Van Brunt, unless they divorced and she had a bastard son to carry on the Van Tassel name. Of course, the Van Tassel name could've survived, but Vicky shouldn't be descended from Katrina. A quick explanation is that the family the name now for public events. As it is, the town of Sleepy Hollow is really just North Tarrytown, NY, which changed its name in 1996.

Edit: Here's an example of what I was talking about with the distracting artwork.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 208 (January 2024)

Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 208
edited by Neil Clarke (January 2024)

Online: https://clarkesworldmagazine.com/prior/issue_208/

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

Neil Clarke is the editor of a fabulous online science fiction magazine, Clarkesworld. (Note: I have submitted many stories to Clarkesworld. As of this writing, I have not been accepted. That doesn't mean I won't stop trying, nor does that bias this review in any way.)

If I've been informed correctly, when Neil goes to conventions, he brings along paperback copies of his magazine that didn't pass quality control. This book in particular is stamped on the inside front cover: This Is A Misprint. The cover failed quality control but the inside is fine.

This cover evokes a Christmas scene to me, mostly in the covers, but also there's a child and robot. However, a closer look would suggest it's spring because of the birds and the flowers on the bushes. What I thought at first to be lights are actually butterflies.

I must've picked this up soon after it was published because this was a magazine that I was reading in the pool in the summer of 2024! I didn't finish the book, so I brought it to school and assumed that I'd read it during lunch and then leave the book in a Little Free Library during one of my walks. But I never got around to reading that last four-page story. And then I left the book here for summer 2025!

I made a resolution to start reading some of the books that are piling up behind my desk in school as much as they are in my bedroom and basement.

I finished this, but I have to skim the front to remind myself of the other stories because it's been a while. Also, there's a nonfiction article that might be worth reading that isn't an interview.

The stories include: note, I finished this a couple weeks ago and have read other books and start a new issue

• Nothing of Value by Aimee Ogden. (I know Ogden as an editor that I've submitted to and I believe I've read her work before as well.) This story involves teleportation by "Skip" technology where one body is destroyed and another one is created. It reminded me a little of how it worked in Dark Matter, where a new body was created (except that one was temporary) and when you traveled back the new memories went with you. In this story, the heartbroken and jilted lover comes back to Earth without the new memories, so he's basically forced to repeat his trip because he doesn't know what happened, and it apparently plays out about the same every time. (The narrative bothered me a bit in the way the narrator spoke.)
• Down the Waterfall by Cécile Cristofari.
• Binomial Nomenclature and the Mother of Happiness by Alexandra Munckown the Waterfall by Cécile Cristofari
• tars Don't Dream by Chi Hui, translated by John Chu.
• Just Another Cat in a Box by E.N. Auslender.
• Rail Meat by Marie Vibbert.
• You Dream of the Hive by C. M. Fields.
• You Cannot Grow in Salted Earth by Priya Chand.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Straight On Till Morning (Strohm / Sofi)

Straight On Till Morning: A Twisted Tale
Stephanie Kate Strohm / Noor Sofi
Adapted from the book by Stephanie Kate Strohm (2024)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This past fall, I started looking for more standalone graphic novels at the library, both to read and to find examples of artwork that I could show in my Graphic Novel class. This was one that caught my eye. I saw that it was a Twisted Tale (although I was sure what that meant at the time). Only recently did I notice that it was adapted from an earlier book.

It's funny that Disney now owns Marvel, and Marvel created the comic "What if...?" because this starts off like a "What if" book, but this doesn't carry that title.

A quick check on the original book shows me that Stephanie Kate Strohm is known for reimagining Disney classics, not just only books and fairy tales. The reason I was curious about this is that I wanted to know when it because a Disney product, if it had been designed that way. There are points in the story where I wonder if they were inspired by the original nvoel or by the stage show (which I may have seen once, but I'm familiar with some of the music).

In this story, Peter Pan never flew to Wendy's house to find his shadow. Wendy and the boys grew up a bit. During that time, Wendy was still telling stories about Neverland, which she's dreamed of even if she's never visited. Angry that Peter never came, Wendy makes a deal with Captain Hook -- she trades him Peter's shadow in exchange for passage. It's a trap, of course, but a friendly pirate sets her free.

Neverland isn't what she thought it was, and neither are the Lost Boys who have a Lost Girl (or Lost Person) among them.

Wendy learns that Tinkerbell kept Peter away from her because she was jealous. Tinkerbell takes a piece of Wendy's voice so that she can speak (although the other fairies don't seem to have a problem...), and the two becomes friends. They set off to find and rescue Peter, who is searching in dangerous places for his shadow. Meanwhile, Hook plans to use the shadow to destroy Neverland.

Wendy learns that her stories have the power to shape Neverland, but so do many other children who dream about it. She also learns that the best way to save Neverland is to try to reshape her own world, even if she is a woman. (In the epilogue, there's almost a nod to Mary Poppins as the narrative jumps ahead even more years so that she can be a suffrogette.

It was an enjoable book for what it is, and it was a quick read. I managed to complete it in a couple of train rides. Meanwhile, it's been sitting next to the bed for probably three or four months. It only came out a year and a half ago. There isn't much demand for it, assuming people know about it. In any case, it's back on the shelves.

I have a couple more graphic novels and manga from the library to get to and even more in my classroom.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

The Cartographers (Shepherd)

The Cartographers: A Novel
Peng Shepherd (2022)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a Pandemic Book Club selection.

The meeting was last night, according to when this was posted, but I wrote this yesterday, so the meeting hasn't happened yet. I might include an update.

The book starts with the murder of a prestigious reseracher at the Central Branch of the New York Public Library. His estranged daughter, Nell, who used to work with him, is called to the library by the cops and her former coworker. A mystery three decades old starts to unravel at this point and it centers on a old, seemingly worthless, road map that Nell found in what is referred to as "the Junk Box incident."

She was fired for arguing with her father when he was in fact her boss. He coworker Felix, a fellow intern, was fired at the same time. Swann, a kindly uncle-type figure, had always looked out for her and had hoped that she'd be able to come back.

Nell and Felix are both cartographers. Felix ends up working with maps for a big company, while Nell winds up creating fake relicas of old maps (with dragons and sea sprites added) in a cramped office in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

Nell follows what clues (and what maps) she has to figure out this mystery, and as she does, she learns about this mysterious group, the Cartographers, that's something of a legend in map-collecting circles. Mild spoiler: they were her parents and five friends from school. They were all together on the day her mother died and Nell suffered burns in a fire in a cabin in upstate New York when Nell was three years old.

Each time she meets one of them, we get a little more of the background of what happened back in those days related to her. And every time, when learn that there were more secrets among the group other than the biggest secret: Agloe, a phantom settlement that only appears if you have the correct map. And it was only on one map. And every copy of that map is missing, stolen by collectors.

It turns out that someone out there would kill for that map. And then have a secret way into and out of the library and other places as well.

Edit: I'll put this here because it seems like a good place. Overall, everyone in the book club seemed to enjoy the book overall, but everyone also had a problem with the ending and with the motives of the villain -- and everyone else's, really, when you get down to it.

End of edit

I enjoyed this book, and I wasn't overly happy with the ending, but I rolled with it. Likewise, when police and murder are involved but there's a fantastical element at work, there's a bit of disbelief suspension at work.

But there was one thing that I did have to call out: for how well researched this book is -- Agloe in particular was a real place at one particular time because of a phantom settlement on a map -- there was a glaring error that someone should have caught. They flee from police and he up to the town through the Lincoln Tunnel and then spend hours on I-95.

I-95 does NOT go to upstate New York! They were on that highway for maybe 20 minutes, unless they secret went through New England.

Now, this should be a quibble. If the author had invented, say, State Road 145, I wouldn't have thought twice about it. But not only is I-95 a major thoroughfare -- BUT THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT MAPS!! How do you get something like this wrong? Especially when they're using a road map!

That aside, I enjoyed the book unfolding. I didn't think the stakes were high enough for some of the reactions the characters had or the actions that they took, but by the end, things were explained to not be as they seemed. Still that ending.

Second edit: One of the group members complained about one character morphing into a Bond villain.

I enjoyed this book, and now that the audiobook became available, I might listen to it for the next couple weeks.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

DNF: Moonbase Armstrong (Marks)

Moonbase Armstrong
edited by Robert B. Marks (2026)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a free Advanced Reader Copy from Library Thing. I'm encouraged (but not required) to leave reviews in exchange for the free books.

I left the following review on the Library Thing website:

Moonbase Armstrong started off well enough, introducing the characters at a lunar base as a ship is landing on the Moon. The ship explodes, which sets up the rest of the book.

After that, it fell apart for me. I found it hard to believe that this was a NASA installation or that any of these people possibly worked for NASA. There was no contingency plan for a disaster. Okay, but then you think that every on the Moon and back on Earth would be working around the clock to form a plan, and then present it clearly.

The narrative wasn't going anywhere and little things were starting to bother me. I read about 25-30% of the book before giving up, which is longer than I usually stay with a book that I DNF.

---

More of a breakdown of the stories, which doesn't belong on Library Thing:

Actually, there isn't much more to breakdown. It wasn't good. It didn't hold my interest. And the recovery plan took forever to formulate and at 30% of the way through the book, they haven't set out yet, despite the ship blowing up in the initial pages.

I mention the words "around the clock", and I chose those carefully, instead of Day and Night. Why? Because day and night each last about two weeks each on the Moon. This is, of course, acknowledge. The author isn't a moron. But the characters do keep saying this like "tonight" and "first thing in the morning", which don't make sense, particularly in a NASA setting.

Also, an important mission wouldn't happen "first thing in the morning". It would happen at, say, 0600 hours. This is another thing -- there is no reference (so far as I got) to military time despite it being a government orgazination site. It's little things like this I notice, particularly when the author goes out of the way to mention other little things to let us know that he knows them (and you wonder if the characters did when they get informed, because they should.)

One thing that bothered me was the overuse of the words "Three seconds passed" during every exchange with video calls from the Moon to Earth. Every. Time. And yet --

The head of the moonbase, whose wife just died back on Earth, decides to stay on until the investigation is over. He says, "Just take 'yes' for an answer."

"Three seconds passed. Jim said nothing."

Seriously? Here was a great writing opportunity -- He could've written. "Three seconds passed. Four. Five. Six... Ten. Jim said nothing."

At least then, all the repetition would've had a payoff.

The only other note I'll make (because I stopped soon after this) was there was a very odd medical checkup for two people who are being sent to the Moon. One of them (the non-POV character) is named Ike. I think Ike is male since Ike wasn't asked about pregnancy. Then, the very next section has a POV character named AIKO, who I initially assumed was the same Ike, except this Aiko was definitely female, and was already on the Moon. Not the same character, check.

Also Aiko is introduced in the middle of a ridiculous, almost embarrassly so, sex scene that served no purpose and was a differnt tone from the rent of the book, so far. Not how you want to introduce this character. Also, if you can't write these scenes, DON'T TRY. Gloss over it the way you gloss over so many other things.

I'll have to make a note not to request any more of Robert Marks in the same way that I don't request any more bigfoot. They might think I have a problem with them with poor reviews. Marks also wrote The Fairy Godmother's Tale, which I'd forgotten about when I requested this one. I asked for this one simple for the lunar base story, not that I saw much of the base.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.