Release Blitz, Review & Giveaway: TS901 by Stacey Rourke & Tish Thawker

Title: TS901: Anomaly Rise of the Rebels

Series: The TS901 Chronicles

Author: Stacey Rourke & Tish Thawer

Genre: NA Fantasy Dystopian 

Release Date: August 1, 2017

On Sale for 99 Pennies 

Tainted water for the good of the people. Fluoride and vitamins to sustain the health of the human race. Added ingredients to extend and elevate the quality of life. All good things, right?

Wrong. 

Thia Kelly has been changed by the TS901 chemical in the world’s water supply. Now, forced into hiding with the other inflicted outcasts, she struggles to survive as her powers emerge.

Evan Daniels hunted for others like himself, and finding Thia suddenly brought meaning back into his life. Love blossomed between the strange couple while they searched for a way to reverse the effects. Unfortunately, the Government had something else in mind. 

Super-soldier creation on a mass scale was their end goal, and thanks to an unfortunate family tie, Evan became Patient #1.

Good-guy? Bad-guy? The world isn’t sure, but Thia is left with only one choice––save the ass of the world’s first Anomaly who just happens to be her boyfriend.

Thia is part of an unfortunate group of people infected by the water distributed TS901.  The concoction, which was intended to help, hurt many people, turning them into anomalies (Malys), who are at odds with the "normal" people, the Narys.  The abnormalities suffered range from physical deformities to "powers" like mind control, sonic voice, and rapid healing.  Because of their differences, the Malyies are segregated into a dilapidated old subway station, always one misstep away from being labeled a dangerous presence and harmed.

Thia is careful to hide her abnormality.  She passes for normal so much that she acts as a liaison between the Malie and Nary worlds.  But when she learns her boyfriend Evan, whose father is a powerful man using his son to push forth an agenda that Evan hopes will bridge the divide between the two opposing sides, Thia springs into action.  She employs the help of a haphazard group.  There is Eugene, who spends too much time drunk but really just misses his family.  Eugene has a sonic boom voice.  Then there is Gigi, a beautiful scientist with evolving powers.  These powers let her control minds and create illusions.  These do provide very useful modes of trickery when the group infiltrated the "Hill," a secure base, to rescue Evan.  The group is accompanied, though not on purpose, by a Nary named Lance.  Initially, he is part of the border guard that keeps the peace between the Malies and the Narys, but he betrays his station when he goes rogue to rescue his mother from the military men at the Hill.  But it turns into more than a rescue mission, but rather a race to avoid war between the Malies and the Narys.

I loved the pace of TS901.  There is a ton of action-- you run the story through your mind like a movie as it plays out because that is exactly how the story reads. I also thought that the concept was very unique.  The basic plot of mutation and genetic segregation has been done a lot, but TS901 is refreshing and new because the world in which our characters are placed is unique and well thought out.  It bears mentioning that every character is fleshed out and fully developed-- they seem realistic and therefore believable.  The suffering of the characters is almost palpable, and you root for each and every one to have a happy ending.  I think this novel fits nicely within the dystopia genre.  Long live the revolution.  

RONE Award Winner for Best YA Paranormal Work of 2012 for Embrace, a Gryphon Series Novel

Young Adult and Teen Reader voted Author of the Year 2012

Turning Pages Magazine Winner for Best YA book of 2013 & Best Teen Book of 2013 

Readers' Favorite Silver Medal Winner for Crane 2015

Stacey Rourke is the author of the award winning YA Gryphon Series, the chillingly Legends Saga, and the romantic comedy Reel Romance Series. She currently hard at work on the Unfortunate Soul Chronicles, and additional literary projects. She lives in Michigan with her husband, two beautiful daughters, and two giant dogs. She loves to travel, has an unhealthy shoe addiction, and considers herself blessed to make a career out of talking to the imaginary people that live in her head.

Award Winning Author, Tish Thawer, writes paranormal romances for all ages. Her magickal elements and detailed world-building are a welcome constant in every novel.

Before becoming a writer she worked as a computer consultant, a photographer and a graphic designer. She also operates a custom glass etching business, in addition to being a wife and the mother of three wonderful children.

She's been a fan of the paranormal for as long as she can remember. Anything to do with superpowers, myth and magic has always held a special place in her heart. From her first paranormal cartoon, Isis, to the phenomenon that is Twilight, this genre has always been a part of her life.

 

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Comic Review: Tank Girl (vol. 1) By Hewlett and Martin

Title- Tank Girl (vol. 1)

Author(s)- Hewlett and Martin 

Genre- Comic - Adventure, Comic - Humor, Comic - Dystopia 

Tank Girl is hard to describe. She is utterly insane and lives in a post-apocalyptic world consisting of talking kangaroos, villains, and yes, her giant tank. The good thing about Tank Girl is, number one, she doesn’t care what people think. Number two she is fearless. Number three? Well, her fashion sense in amazing. The back describes Tank Girl as “an ignorant, beer-swilling, bestial skinhead [who becomes] an ignorant, beer-swilling, bestial blonde in a tank.” What’s more to love? 

Volume 1 of Tank Girl encompasses 15 issues ranging from October 1988 to February 1990. The comics are utterly, but purposefully, non Sequitur and it’s beautiful. I read through many panels thinking, “I don’t know what is going on but I love it.”

A woman like tank girl naturally has a lot of enemies. Or makes enemies along the way. Besides Booga, a trusted Kangaroo companion. Things don’t always come out the way Tank Girl plans, but she always comes out the insane victor at the end. It’s hard to defeat a woman who is, as I said, utterly insane and possesses a tank.

There are some really good features to the anthology. I particularly liked the cut out Tank Girl paper doll. It comes complete with uni-cycle and flask of coffee. The end also features a few pages of the original color covers of a few issues. I love it when anthologies include the covers—it gives a greater sense of what the comic looked like when it came out and it feels you are truly reading the comics as pieces and not as one whole massive storyline.

Book Review: Bioshock Infinite- Mind in Revolt by Joe Fielder

Name- BioShock Infinite- Mind in Revolt 

Author- Joe Fielder with Ken Levine 

Genre- Fiction -Video Game, Fiction - Dystopia

When you play Bioshock Infinite, you encounter an anarchist group called the Vox Populi (Voice of the People), led by former house slave to the Columbian royal family, the Comstock's, Daisy Fitzroy. According to the game, Daisy killed lady Comstock and went on a mad rampage since, inciting revolt and rebellion. Of course, you know from the tone of the game that Daisy is innocent, was set up, but a lot of the backstory relies on reading between the lines and intuning.

Mind in Revolt is "based" on a scientific piece called The Psychology of Dissent Interviews with The Anarchist Daisy Fitzroy by Dr. Francis Pinchot. Dr. Pinchot is a member of the Columbian Founding clan. When anarchist and murderer Daisy Fitzroy is captured, he is allowed to take her for psychological evaluation. The game storyline has already established that Daisy is very charismatic, intelligent, and savvy. She's a hard woman to trick, and doesn't fall easily for people's attempts at dishonesty or misdirection. Naturally, a psychological evaluation would be difficult. Mind in Revolt gives us a greater sense of who and what Daisy Fitzroy is. She is even able to persuade a founder, a Doctor, to aid her in her rebellion. That is the nature of charisma and intellect-- she just inspires people through her rhetoric and knowledge. For anyone into the Bioshock series, this short read is well worth it. You learn a little more about Daisy, but also about Columbia and Comstock.

Book Review: Divergent (Divergent, #1) by Veronica Roth

Title: Divergent 

Series: Divergent

Book Numner: 1

Author: Veronica Roth 

Genre: Fiction - Dystopia, Fiction - YA 

Finished: March 31, 2014

It took me two tries to finish Divergent. As a big fan of the Hunger Games, a friend of mine recommended that I try out the Divergent series. So, heeding this advice, I purchased the e-book version of Divergent. My very first impression was that I liked the concept. Despite a real backstory for the ‘dystopia’ that Roth created, I still found it an absolutely compelling world. I liked the concept of keeping “control” of people by dividing people into factions through which they can contribute the most to society. In the story, a young girl named Beatrice Prior, member of the Abnegation faction. When it comes time for her to take her Aptitude test, the test through which she will find out the best faction for her, her test comes out that she has qualities appropriate for all factions, a condition known as Divergent. This, according to the government, is dangerous. They want people to fit into molded groups, not to be free thinkers. Honestly, not knowing that happens in later books, I couldn’t help but wonder why this wasn’t a more prevalent condition. Human nature is ultimately hard to contain. Beatrice can’t be Divergent, which must be kept a secret, so she elect to join the Dauntless faction. Dauntless are the protectors... the soldiers, the police, the fearless fighters. It’s a long road for Beatrice, who changes her name to Tris. Predictably, Tris becomes the most powerful of the new initiates and gets the hottest guy in the Dauntless faction: Four. It took me two tries because I felt like the romance between Tris and Four took away a lot from the plot. Something about the constant kissing just put me off because I wanted more than that. I wanted action, conflict more than just “is it okay to like this guy” and to learn more about the world in which these people live. Of course, I will read the other two books because now I feel invested in the series and I hope that with the romance out of the way and established, we can get on to things more deeply plot driven.

Book Review: Pompeii by Robert Harris

Title: Pompeii 

Author: Robert Harris 

Genre: Fiction - Historical

I'm still working toward my goal of reading as many books taking place in Ancient Rome as humanly possible in my lifetime. That was what influenced me to pick up Robert Harris's Pompeii. Well that and I have read another novel of his, Imperium, and really loved it. In Pompeii, we enter the Imperial Age, August 79 AD. This is a post-Augustus Roman world, ya'll, so the Roman Empire is expanding with ever increasing passion, and the troubled times of the economic crisis and subsequent invasions is a problem still far in the future by a century and then some. Rome is a powerful, proud, and glimmering empire ruled by the Flavian emperor Titus. Rather than take us through a historical drama about the eruption of Pompeii, Harris prefers to use the eruption as context for another sort of story. His tale centers around a young aquarius named Marcus Attilius who has been sent to care for the Aqua Augusta, one of the many aqueducts that flowed through the Roman world. The Aqua Augusta carried water from Terminio-Tuoro toward the Bay of Naples, supplying water to cities like Pompeii, Misenum, and Nola. The aquarius soon begins to notice strange things taking place. First, the former aquarius is missing. Then there is the strange smell of sulfur in the water. Then the aqueduct begins to stop supplying water. Finally the aquarius takes his team toward Vesuvius to find where the break has occurred and fix it. Of course he manages to anger some very important men in Pompeii, most notably a rich former slave who has made a ton of money in retail following the earthquake of 62 AD, which we now know was a foreshock of the impending eruption. What caused the stopping of the water was a massive underground shift of earth, which is just another thing to foreshadow the impending disaster. The aquarius doesn't realize what is going on until it is too late. Then we are taken through the dramatic moments of eruption, confusion, panic, death, and finally end. The cast of Pompeii also includes some notables. Pliny the Elder makes an appearance, and it is only fitting that he does since he and his nephew Pliny the Younger are the pair that supplied us with the most information about the eruption of Vesuvius, through the Elder unfortunately lost his life due to his insatiable curiosity for the natural world. 

Harris isn't, at least to my knowledge, a historian. He does seem to have a great interest in Rome since he has written at least three books that I know of about the subject. Part of the reason I chose to read Pompeii is because I felt Imperium was not only well written, but paid great attention to historical accuracy without coming across as pompous or loaded with historical detail to compensate for an author's lack of historical training. Harris pays very great attention to historical accuracy, juggling his facts with his prose so that his story isn't inundated with too much detail such that it reads like a textbook. The story is interesting, while at the same time you find yourself unintentionally learning things about Ancient Rome: things about their political system, their various classes, social mobility, architecture, resources, knowledge, etc. It presents itself as a intense and informative story, a snapshot if you will, of what happened just before one of the worst natural disasters of Roman history. It connects us more with the past as not something only isolated to facts, details, and carbonized relics, but we get to see the people and life involved.

Book Review: Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, #3) by Suzanne Collins

Title: Mockingjay

Series: The Hunger Games

Book Number: 3

Author: Suzanne Collins 

Genre: Fiction - Dystopia 

Finished: February 11, 2013

Can it suffice to say only that this final book was everything that I had hoped for and more?  I wasted no time loading this one on my Kindle after I had finished the second book of the trilogy. Of course I could guess the rough chronology of the book: lots of rebel fighting, lots of drama, and of course a victory, no matter how sweet or bittersweet. I knew there would be war, and I knew that independence would be gained. That doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy the journey. And that also doesn’t mean I wasn’t caught off guard a number of times by a few well placed and indeed shocking plot twists. Instead, it meant that I was sincerely and deeply hoping for the sort-of-happy-ending that the characters deserved and that I needed in order to feel fulfilled. In short, I wanted Katniss alive and with Peeta. So the war is on. District 13 is working to inspire rebel forces across Panem, and are quite successful. The leaders of the rebellion use Katniss as a sort of mascot, but she is not the sort of girl to give clean televised appearances, so there is a lot of battle and explosion going on.

Thank goodness, right?

I mean it wouldn’t be a Hunger Game novel without a lot of blood, guts, and blown up things. The part that I liked the best (in my predictable nature) was the inevitable tension that arose after Peeta was rescued and he had been brainwashed... reprogrammed... designed to hate and indeed kill Katniss. Naturally, I gave in to a rare sense of optimism that love would prevail, yadda, yadda, yadda. 

It was this plot arch in particular that I enjoyed reading the most. I wish there was more to it, that it was longer, more involved. The course of the rebellion was interesting and great, yes, but I like things that are a little less action and adventure, and a little more drama. I also did not expect a few of the deaths that took place. I mean, this isn't George R.R. Martin, after all, right, who kills everyone you love. I thought that there would at least be a bright light at the end of the tunnel for the suffering. But not so. I guess that is just part of the realism, of creating a world that is real, intense, and that you can live inside of. Even go so far as to grieve with. The emotional connection would be nothing without something to grieve over, right? At least, that is how I comfort myself.

Book Review: Catching Fire (Hunger Games, #2) by Suzanne Collins

Title: Catching Fire

Series: Hunger Games

Book Number: 2

Author: Suzanne Collins 

Genre: Fiction - Dystopia 

Finished: February 5, 2013

I decided to read this book in order to prepare myself for the movie; I would rather spoil a movie by reading the book than spoil a book by seeing the movie first. I didn't go into reading this book with any preconceived notions about how the plot may manifest itself, so I relied on the first few pages to gain a sense of how the book may progress. Essentially, now a victor of the Hunger Games, Katniss is the target for the ire of the Capitol, specifically President Snow. Before even Katniss realizes what she means to the rest of the various districts, the President is painfully aware that she stands as an icon of rebellion and indeed revolution, which he certainly cannot stand. So naturally, of course, he seeks to eliminate her as a threat. The book is really two distinct stories. The first part of the story of of Katniss trying to survive back in District 12 after the games, trying to become normal again, and ultimately trying to quell any possible threat of district rebellion in order to placate President Snow and protect her family/friends. The part effectively ends when she discovers that there is no way to stop the anger of the districts, who are using her act of defiance as a sort of rallying cry to justify their own defiance. As a result, there is no pleasing President Snow, and she fears no hope of saving the people she cares about. Which brings us to part 2, the Quarter Quell, an anniversary event. At every 25 year period, the games are given a special feature, a new twist. This quarter's twist is, and predictably so, that those in the arena must be past winners of the Games. This assures, as the only female from District 12, that Katniss will be in the arena. I admit, I saw this coming. Even as I was reading part 1, I kept telling myself, "This president is going to find a way to make it so Katniss has to reenter the games." I wasn't certain how he would do so, but I was confident that he would find a way, as this would be an easy and entertaining way to get rid of her while at the same time showing the burgeoning revolutionaries throughout the various districts the cost of defiance. Katniss goes into the arena this time determined to give her life to protect Peeta; there is no way to save them both, and the President wants her death badly enough to make sure she regrets not dying. If anything, she can save Peeta, who she sees as an innocent in her machinations. Little does she know that behind the scenes, Haymitch has been working out his own dealings, convincing the other Tributes to, no matter the cost, keep Peeta alive, too. Once again, the pair are at the center of a conspiracy that they do not have much of a say in, or much knowledge of for that matter. I found the nature of the games arena this time to be wonderfully creative. 

I really had to applaud Collins for the uniqueness of the setting. It was more than just a landscape of traps and scattered threats for tributes to chase each other around. I loved the idea of the arena as a clock, and each new hour bringing a new round of chaos to one of the 12 triangular branches. Naturally, not knowing myself of the backroom dealings of Haymitch, I kept waiting for the moment when the alliances formed in the arena would come crashing down on Katniss and Peeta. It is always a wonderful turn of events to find that I have been wrong in my predictions; it forces me not to over think the plot too much and thereby ruin it for myself. I was also very pleased that the few characters I felt taken with had survived, though with varied levels of... safety and success. I am also a massive sucker for a good cliffhanger, though mostly when I have in my possession the next book, which I do. I have already started the third and final book because I have to know what happens with the rebellion, which at the end of the games, is going full scale. And I also have to know what happens between Katniss and Peeta since, ultimately, I am rooting for them. I love a clever dystopia.