This story is perfect for readers that enjoy Vikings and Game of Thrones type stories and characters! It’s a prequel to the Raghnall series, but you could probably jump in here and not be lost.
I really loved Catherine. She is a sassy, feisty lady that doesn’t take crap from anyone! Reading her story was so much fun, and I’m excited to see how she gets from here to House Raghnall to make this story come full circle! Catherine is rescued after an injury by the Olden clan. They were surprising and full of a variety of personalities, and I enjoyed that the story was told through multiple POVs. I had the chance to get some great insight into other characters!
This book was amazing! This is the second book in The Killian Delaney Novels, and if you haven’t read the first book, Seven Crows, I highly recommend it! I’ll add a link to my review of this book a little later in the post!
This series features Killian, our kick-A female lead character, a girl with a unique set of talents to take care of crappy villains. I love her because she’s a flawed character and struggles with her own demons. It makes her relatable. Her talent for tracking down the bad guys, however, is beyond anything I could ever do, and I love reading about her adventures!
A kick-A** female lead will always get me excited about a book, and Death Donor absolutely had that!! Samantha Jones was this interesting, amazing woman.
How I Felt:
The story drops the reader into a world where humans donate their bodies to extend the life of others. It’s the ultimate rich versus poor view of the world. Only the wealthy can afford these procedures, while the poor exchange their lives for the payout to keep the rest of their family alive and fed.
Samantha Jones is a bodyguard for Ethan Anderson, one of the wealthiest men in the world, and an owner of one of the life-extension companies. Her job provides “death insurance” so she considers herself lucky.
Then her daughter goes missing. Ugh, this broke my heart! Sam and her husband search for their daughter and soon find out that she was sold on the black market to an underground lab for body parts to extend someone else’s life.
The adventure and excitement in Legends of Lost Causes Series was perfect for middle-grade readers! I loved the mixture of old west location and fantasy creatures. It created an excellent story that a young reader would love!
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Legends of the Lost Causes by Brad McLelland and Louis Sylvester
How I Felt:
Legends of the Lost Causes features Keech and Sam, two orphans living in the wild west. The time frame and bad-guys for this book make it extremely unique. Set in the 1850s, it has that old feel, yet there are zombie-ish outlaws and magic. The two together created this amazing adventure that I’m sure little readers will love.
The illustrations in this book were AWESOME! They were fun and quirky, and really made me just want to look at each one!
Real Pigeons Fight Crime was just a ton of fun to read! I read this book and also had my 8 year old son read it. We both agreed it was a 5 star read! The pages fairly illustration-heavy making this a great book for a young reader just starting chapter books, but it’s also great for a higher level reader as well!
What I Loved: This book took me on so many twisty turns, I was just in awe! I really loved the way the author created this world and pulled me right in. I was right there with Hogan as he tried to make it into the NSC organization!
How I Felt: I’m giving this book a 5 star because it was great! The story, character building, and surprises were wonderful. There is a little character building for a friend of the main character who probably doesn’t seem to be needed in the story, but it is fairly brief and may be a set up for book 2. The first 20% of the book is building out the world, showing us how the common people are living. We gain some background on Hogan, the main character, as well as the overall culture of the civilization now. From there, the book takes off on this crazy story that is so fast-paced and well told!
To Read or Not To Read: I highly recommend this book for readers that enjoy action and post-apocalyptic stories!
What’s This Book About Anyway?
In 2031, the world is a different place. The oceans are rising, the wealthy are extremely wealthy and well off, while the other 99% live in poverty, struggling to find work, food, and lodging from day-to-day.
Hogan is an ex-officer of the police force. He spends his days applying for a position with the NSC, where he would be set for life. Then, the acceptance letter comes, and he’s in! He boards transportation and heads to the NSC base for a rigorous competition to be the ONE candidate that makes it into the NSC. Can he do it? As he fights to make it to the top of this group, he starts to realize that the NSC may not be exactly what he had dreamed it would be.
I received a copy of this advanced reader’s copy for free. I am leaving my review voluntarily.
All Amazon links on SheJustLovesBooks are affiliate links and I receive a small percentage of sales from the use of them. If you fall in love with a book because of my review and you want to buy, I would greatly appreciate the use of the link on my page.
What I Loved: The setting of this book was in Japan and covered a variety of locations. The writing really took me to each of these places and made me appreciate each one’s beauty.
How I Felt: I loved this book. It was fast-paced with a lot of action to keep my attention all the way through. The beginning of the book was a bit of a struggle as there are a lot of Japanese words thrown in right at the start and, not knowing what they meant, I struggled. I finally just realized that I didn’t need to know what they meant, context would help me, or I could look them up. And after that, it wasn’t an issue for me anymore. I thoroughly enjoyed this book from beginning to end. I was interested in the characters and their part in the plot, and I was invested in the story.
To Read or Not To Read: If you enjoy action-packed crime fiction and thrillers, this is a good book for you! It’s a murder-mystery focused on a serial killer that must be stopped.
What’s This Book About Anyway?
Holly Blain is a reporter in Japan covering the celebrity stories, while she really wants to be covering crime. A connection with the police department falls into her lap and she convinces her boss to let her cover the story. She very quickly realizes she has stumbled into quite the story. Two non-Japanese girls are missing, one has just turned up in a city dump, dead with flowers attached to her clothing. Holly and Detective Tanaka are able to find ways to get so close to the serial killer, and yet just miss him. This story takes us through their chase of the killer. As more girls go missing, will they be able to stop the killer before he makes his next masterpiece?
What I Loved: I continue to love this book year after year. I own it on audio and in book form, just so I can read it any way I want at any time. I love the idea of taking on a case that spins into something else entirely.
How I Felt: This book is full of mystery and some action. It kept me wanting more, turning the pages as fast as I could read.
To Read or Not To Read: I will always say read this book. However, if you are interested in legal thrillers, this will be more up your alley.
What’s This Book About Anyway?
Clay Carter is a public defender. He’s overworked and underpaid, and worn out. He takes on the case of just another random street killing…except that it wasn’t.
He digs into the case and finds that there is a huge conspiracy involving a huge pharmaceutical company. Winning this case could completely change his career, but can he do it?
Last Thoughts:
This book has always made me feel like I completely understand mass tort lawsuits. Which, I know, is completely untrue, but during the reading of that book, I feel like an all-knowledgeable lawyer!
What I Loved: I love the mystery in this book and the way the story unfolds. You get little bits of information at different times to start to fill the story in.
How I Felt: This book was hard to get into. I think around page 250 I really got into it. In general, I struggle when books have so much story in the front without much happening, however, I persevered with this book because I had heard such great things. I’m glad I did, because the rest of the book was a nice payoff after struggling at the beginning.
To Read or Not To Read: This was a great book with a mystery that had a great ending. I would recommend it for any thriller lovers! Additionally, it’s a series, so if you love the story, you don’t have to be done with the characters!
What’s This Book About Anyway?
Mikael Blomkvist is a Swedish journalist ready to step away from his regular life now that he has a libel conviction. He partners up with Lisbeth Salander when they are asked to investigate the disappearance of Harriet Vanger. She disappeared over 40 years and her uncle is now looking for answers.
This story takes you on a deep-dive into the background of Harriet and her family to find the truth of where she went and what happened to her. Once you get through all the backstory information in the beginning, it is a page-turning thriller keeping you up late into the night.
The character Killian was such a bad-A$$. I was engrossed with her character. You remember that little movie, Taken, well she’s the female version of that dad. Kate Kessler wrote a book that played like an action movie in my head. Every description she used was just the right one, and I loved it.
How I Felt:
This was a gritty, descriptive book and every time someone landed a punch, I knew exactly how they were feeling. The writing was so well done, I could picture everything. I felt nervous for characters, hoping they were making the right decisions, worried if they would make it out alive. It was a suspense-filled thriller and had me on the edge of my seat.
The story begins with Killian Delaney having just been released from prison for beating a man to within an inch of his life. She’s a bit of a celebrity in the underground circles for this, but she has made an enemy as well. The man she maimed beyond repair, the leader of a biker gang, wants revenge for ruining his life.
Killian’s sister Megan, calls her with the terrifying news that Megan’s daughter, Killian’s niece is missing. Killian is immediately set on a course to get her back and no one will stand in her way. She now needs to step back into her old life with bike gangs and outside-the-law friends to save her niece.
To Read or Not To Read:
This book is perfect for action/thriller lovers. It is full of moving pieces with some mystery and secrets revealed. There’s very little down-time. The book is fast-paced, moving right along.
An ex-con tracks down the men who have kidnapped her niece in this gritty and visceral thriller.
Killian Delaney has a skewed moral compass, a high threshold for pain, and has just been released from prison to discover that someone has taken her niece. Killian does not hesitate. Loyalty is the most important thing in her life, and when she gets a call from her sister saying that her daughter is missing, Killian immediately begins hunting down the men responsible.
She quickly discovers her niece was involved with a notorious biker gang who are engaged in everything from drugs to human trafficking. And to make it worse, the man who sent Killian to jail, the one she nearly beat to death, is at the center of it all.
To save her niece, she’ll need a plan. A smart, quick, and efficient one. Because she’s going to do it right this time. She’ll burn them to the ground.
I was provided an advanced reader’s copy of this book for free. I am leaving my review voluntarily.
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