The Alchemist's Secret by Scott Mariani

The Alchemist's Secret 

Scott Mariani 

Publisher : HarperCollins Publishers; UK ed. edition (July 21, 2011) 

Language : English 

ISBN-10 : 1847563406 

ISBN-13 : 978-1847563408 

I can understand why this book became a best seller. It is right up there with some of the greats when it comes to cryptology. Dan Brown fans will love this book. 

Ben Hope, a man with skills to put Jason Bourne to shame, is hired by a dying billionaire whose granddaughter (with the same name as Ben's lost sister) is dying and needs to locate an ancient manuscript containing a magic formula to save her life. 

 This book is filled with mystic codes, symbols, clues and riddles. In his search for the manuscript, Ben must dodge a heavily armed shadow Christian organization, called Gladius Domini, hell-bent on stopping him. 

 The only issue I have with the book is the amount of hoops, our hero, must jump through and puzzles, riddles he must solve to reach his goal. Just when you think he's finally reached the end, there's another twist. It kind of got to be too much near the end of the book. 

Overall, this is a good and imaginative book with a couple of great plots. It is mostly well written, but the flashbacks are jolting (needed but jolting). Four of the characters I could connect with, but many of the others came across as villainess cardboard cutouts. Ben, Roberta (though some of her actions irritated me), the Archbishop and the Italian lady that fancied Ben (sorry forgot her name. I finished the book a few months ago and forgot to write the review or take notes). 

This book is about an alchemist and the belief he discovered the secrets of immortality and created a potion, that naturally everyone wants. 

 

85%

Relentless -- A horror survival story

Relentless by Christopher Artinian is very short. 4 hours of listening. The length surprised me. I thought it would be longer but it wasn't. Even though it is book 1, it did have a somewhat satisfying ending. 

The story is about Sal and a few of her mates, out on the town, pissed AF. Sal wakes up alone in a forest. Trying to find her friends or a way out, she stumbled on a woman who has a fair idea of what is going on. Eventually, Sal meets up with her friends, only one didn't make it. 

(Said kill above needs to be a bit clearer. I understand the pit but not the other part, as it makes little sense.)

The story is fast paced and overall a great tale. Not an original tale by any means but a more than decent retelling. 

Audiobook version. 

PS: Book two is available. A different setting but same situation. I haven't purchased it yet. But I will. 

Prelude to World War III

Prelude to World War III: The Rise of the Islamic Republic and the Rebirth of America
by James Rosone and Miranda Watson

Amazon Audible.

If I were the kind of person to request a refund (like many Kindle users), I would be on the phone right this second. But, I'm not that kind of person. I live old school. When I buy a book, it's based on the description (blurb) and the cover. I don't care if a zillion other people love it or hated it. I'll make up my own mind. I have opinions. I post them on mostly books, recently audio books. 

The cover is excellent and the artist needs an award. Fantastic imagery. 

I only listened to an hour while at the gym before switching to another book. Maybe the reader was not the right choice especially when hoisting iron, or it could just be the reporter type style of the writers. It didn't feel like a story. I felt like I was back in high school History class listening to the teacher and starting to zone out. When lifting iron, it's a good idea to NOT zone out. 

What I listened to come across as logical, and yes, I could see the plot forming. But it is repetitive (I'm sure I heard the same sentences earlier) and I found little enjoyment in the first hour of listening. However, the beginning is done well and gripping enough to keep the reader/listener enthralled. It soon dulls down.

Unrated. 

 

Elsewhere Dean Koontz

I love the early works of Dean Koontz, especially the books he penned under different names, like, K. R. Dwyer. However in the past few dozen years I haven't found a book of his that I can finish, apart from, The Husband--which was bitching and reviewed somewhere on this site. 

Elsewhere by Dean Koontz is another book I cannot finish. I listened to the audio format and I think the female voice for the girl's scenes wasn't the right choice. Normally, I like it when they have more than one reader, but as an audio play more than reading section by section. 

I got half way through the 10 hour file when I called it quits. 

Dean Koontz is a master at characters. The three main characters jump of the page. The book moves at a good pace for the first handful of chapters, then slow the fuck down after the encounter with a deformed or deranged monkey-boy. I got bored of listening. 

Sorry. Not sorry.

No rating. 

  

A Town Called Discovery -- R.R. Haywood

 Audio Book Version. 

This is an amazing book. The opening must be a prologue. I don't like them so much. Many don't seem to have any relation to the book. As this one didn't. 

A man regains consciousness as he is falling to an ocean. He has no memory. Doesn't know who he is or why he is falling. He hits the water and dies. (reset) Then he is falling again. He dies. (reset) This happens many times until he works out a way to hit the water and survive. There is a woman edging him on. He dies (resets?) many, many times attempting to complete each task. He kills many people, they kill him, he masters how to kill them all. He is pushed past breaking and is rebuilt. With every death, he learns more. Learns from his mistakes. Completing one task, he is faced with another, more brutal than the last. He has a goal to reach a town called Discovery.  

High impact action. Tight, taunt writing, and a storyline that keeps one engaged.

One more thing: it's a time travel story. And a brilliant one.

And it has many one liners, placed perfectly. 

This is my first R. R. Haywood book and it was brilliant. I will check out the Undead and Extraction series. 

Discovery is a town run by an AI called, The Old Lady. Humanity is extinct and The Old Lady believes it wasn't one event, it was many small events throughout time. She built an army. All new recruits are brought in for training. 

The man is named, Bear. His trainer, is Roshi. There's an Australian Doctor Lucy and a Diner owner,  also there is Zara and James. This rounds out the main characters and Mr. Haywood does a brilliant job of making us care about them. Each character has a skill, Zara is smart and logical, James is American and has the gift of the gab. 

Zara, James and Bear. There was a forth, Thomas, but he couldn't cope with a harrowing task and was reassigned.

Get this book. You'll love it. 

95%

 

The Vacation (aka: The Holiday)

The Vacation

T. M. Logan

St. Martians Press.

I discovered this new author when his second book came out. I was introduced to him on the book, 29 seconds, and became a fan of T. M. Logan and signed up to his newsletter. Then I bought his national bestseller. The first book he wrote. I didn't like it. It didn't seem to have direction and wandered around a lot. 

Next up was The Holiday aka The Vacation. It opened well and then went directly into character development and the worry the MC felt after discovering some disturbing emails on her husband's phone. I didn't mind this. Sometimes we need big set ups. 

But, there was a lot of unbelievable over reactions to minor incidents and there wasn't a lot of tension in many scenes. I'd say, no tension. The book fell flat and by chapter 14, I tossed the book away. Sorry. 

It was well written and most of the characters are written well. But where is the plot, murder and mayhem? Tense action??? 

I always give "new to me" writers a few chances to hook me with their books. For example, Lee Child's first Reacher book, how the heck did that get published? But from tripwire and up, most of the books are awesome. There are some truly awful first books out there, mine included (Blood of the Wolf -- out of print). 

So I will give T. M. Logan, one more chance. He has another book coming out soon. 

No Rating. 

PS: I just went over to read some reviews. All 5 stars. WTF??? Don't believe them, folks. They get free copies. I pay for my books. 

Flesh and Steel

Flesh and Steel -- a Warhammer novel 

https://warhammer40000.com/

This is the first ever Warhammer novel I've read. I have never played the game (I'm generally not a gamer). It took me a short while to understand the concepts and the universe this book is set in. The language also took a few listening's to get it. Those who play the game might feel right at home with this world. 

I also liked it. The story is basically a detective novel with two story lines that twist into one. One has reprogrammed Servitor-bots that kill, and the other is a missing girl from a wealthy family. The detective is called Probator Symeon Noctis, he is from the wealthy community that he shunned. Guilt, understanding how the others live and the manner in which he treated others in his youth. 

When a bisected corpse is discovered in the neutral zone, Symeon walks into his most difficult case yet. He is joined by tech-priest Rho-1 Lux of the Collegiate Extremis (mostly called Lux). She is partially augmented with ports that can connect to machines in an attempt to "see" in machine code, the final few moments of a servitor. 

All up, this is a pretty good mystery. Seemed to drag a bit near the end, however, I didn't guess the 'whodunit' part. That's a change. 

75%