Linda Welz

As a child, Linda remembers reading every Nancy Drew mystery available.  The end of each chapter left her salivating to find out what happened next.  Fast-forward 20+ years when she worked as a bookstore manager.  That’s when the love of all books permeated her soul.  Which leads to today’s opportunity to share that love with others through review.  Today she is an avid reader and collector of cookbooks, children’s books, self-help and how-to books among others.  Linda is always on the lookout for compelling books for her adult and teen daughters and her grandchildren.    Linda is a 24-year veteran with the U.S. Air Force, currently serving full time in the U.S. Air Force Reserve as a public affairs specialist.  She is a two-time winner of the Defense Department’s Thomas Jefferson Award for excellence and professionalism in military print and broadcast media.  Her career specialties also include medical administration and video production and documentation with combat camera.  Linda plans to retire from the military in 2016 but continue her work with them in a civilian capacity.    Linda, the middle child of three, is an Ohio native, who currently resides in Southern California with her husband, youngest daughter, two miniature Schnauzers and two cats.  Her oldest daughter, son-in-law, granddaughter and grandson are a military family, living in Alaska.  Her son and daughter-in-law live in Nevada and are expecting their first child.  She is a lifetime member of the Barry Manilow International Fan Club and willingly admits it.  Linda is an active member of her daughter’s school and her church community.  Her claim to fame is winning the big deal of the day on Let’s Make a Deal and singing on stage with Barry Manilow.

Axie Barclay

Ax is a Michigan writer with a cow-habit. When she’s not milking cows, making disgruntled noises at what disgusting thing the heeler dogs dredge up, riding horses, or keeping the fence up around her small beef herd, she’s holed up reading a book or tapping out stories and articles on her laptop. She graduated with a B.S. degree in English, Journalism, and Anthropology from Central Michigan University. She’s usually hard at work on various works of fiction, poetry, nonfiction articles, and book reviews, and has begun to dabble in commercial writing as well. When she’s not working, she enjoys kicking back with her honey and friends at a campfire with some hardy-flavored beers, and she makes a mean mojito. Chat her up at barclayfarmsandlit.blogspot.com where she delves into literature and farming with a relish… and occasionally ketchup. Some of her articles can be found at  www.suite101.com/profile.cfm/axbarclay. She’s also on twitter and facebook at www.twitter.com/axieb and www.facebook.com/axieb.

Robyn Oxborrow

I am a part-time freelance writer and editor based in Reno, NV. As a native Nevadan–first born and raised in Pahrump, then relocated to Reno to attend the University of Nevada, Reno–I find the desert both relaxing and a challenge at times since the weather can change quickly. I graduated in May  2009 with B.A. in English writing and minor in photography.  During my last year at UNR, I lucky to have interned at the University Of Nevada Press and gain a wealth of knowledge about book publishing. I have a growing interest in working for print and online publishers, and greatly enjoy helping others to develop their ideas into a story or artwork.

In my free time, I enjoy writing, rock climbing, lounging by the Truckee River or Lake Tahoe when the weather permits, taking part in Reno’s interesting nightlife, and visiting San Diego or San Francisco when I can get the chance. Currently, I’ve been taking poetry workshops and learning web development.

You can find me at http://www.linkedin.com/in/roxborrow or www.roxborrow.com (under development).

Jennifer Melville

Jennifer Melville is a freelance writer currently living in sunny Jacksonville, Florida. She is a busy mother of four and the proud wife of a Navy helicopter pilot. She holds a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Maryland. She was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest but has traveled all over the United States since marrying her husband in 2004.

Jennifer’s work has appeared in multiple print and online publications, including Natural Awakenings Magazine, Women’s Digest, Jax4Kids Magazine, Jax Air News, and the San Francisco Chronicle. She has written book reviews for the Story Circle Network for several years and always has a new novel on her nightstand. Crime mysteries and historical romances are her all-time favorites. She is currently writing a Y.A. novel, as well as a historical romance.

Stacia Levy

Stacia Levy is a linguistics and ESL professor in California. She currently works at National University and University of the Pacific.  Research interests include academic writing and second language learners. She has published two academic texts.

Her first love, however, is fiction, and she enjoys literary fiction, as well mysteries and romance. She has completed one romance novel, and is working on a mystery/crime novel about hate crime on a college campus. (Both the crime and campus are fictional, despite some readers’ concern to the contrary.)  She recently won an honorable mention in the Writer’s Digest Popular Fiction Awards for her short story, “Father.”  She lives in Sacramento with her husband and daughter.

Jodi M. Webb

Jodi Webb was destined to be an enthusiastic reader. Her mother was an English teacher with a rec room with shelves of books whose idea of a good time was to take all the kids to the library. Like her mom, Jodi’s idea of a good time is taking her kids to the library where all the librarians know her by name. Speaking of names, she named her older daughter after a character in a book. Her other two kids have names with less literary roots.    When she isn’t perusing the dusty library shelves, Jodi is busy writing something she hopes will someday sit on those shelves. As a writer, Jodi has hundreds of magazine articles to her credit as well as one book Pennsylvania Trivia. She keeps working on that historical novel that just won’t end! And in between she organizes blog tours for authors through WOW-Women on Writing and writes two blogs: Words by Webb and Schuylkill Matters.   The last book store in Jodi’s county closed in early 2010. Their months long going-out-of-business sale was like the longest wake ever. Book lovers were constantly meeting at the store to buy ”Just one more book.” Now the nearest bookstore is 45 minutes away(Jodi timed it). So when she had the opportunity to review books, Jodi jumped at the chance. She missed that feeling of discovering a jewel unexpectedly on the bookstore shelves. Now she gets her fix via packages from the San Francisco/Sacramento Book Reviews.

George Erdosh

George is a culinary scientist, food writer, and certified cooking teacher with a strong science and research background (Ph.D., McGill University, Montreal).  He is the author of 10 published food-related books: a six-book series for young readers Cooking Throughout American History and The African-American Kitchen; Start and Run a Catering Business (in its 4^th edition, translated into five languages), Tried and True Recipes from a Caterer’s Kitchen and What Recipes Don’t Tell You, as well as numerous articles and magazines and newspapers.

Originally an exploration geologist, he switched career to be a high-end caterer, a business he ran for more than 10 years, before switching to food writing and running cooking classes.

Katie Cappello

A native of Phoenix, Arizona, and former resident of New Orleans, Katie Cappello currently resides in Walnut Grove, a small farming town in the Sacramento Delta.  She graduated with an MFA in Poetry from Arizona State University, where she edited Hayden’s Ferry Review.  Her poems can be found in journals, such as Burnside Review, Cave Wall, Crab Orchard Review, Fourteen Hills, and Los Angeles Review.

Katie is the author of the poetry collection Perpetual Care (Elixir Press, 2009) and the chapbook A Classic Game of Murder (Dancing Girl Press, 2009).  Katie is, in equal measure, a freelance wizard, reading fiend, and haphazard gardener.  She blogs about literature and life on the farm at www.drowningthefield.blogspot.com.

Albert Riehle

Albert Riehle consented to step away from the blogosphere and write book reviews for us, but feels badly about using his powers for evil instead of good.  Wracked with guilt over becoming a critic, he often cries himself to sleep at night wondering what his heroes Han Solo and Obi-Wan Kenobi would think of him for joining the Dark Side.  Only the fact that his opinions about books (and everything else for that matter) are always right give him any comfort.

When he’s not reading and reviewing, Albert is usually found working as a Sales & Marketing Manager.  He enjoys long, romantic walks on the beach, but not as much as he loves short, spiteful sprints on the water.  His beloved hometown Chicago Cubs have broken his heart 35 times and counting.  Albert has broken far fewer television sets after learning to surround himself with soft, squishy items when the Cubs game is on so that when he throws them, he does less damage.  Most of his blogs are like Fight Club; the first rule is that you can’t talk about them—or where to find them—but he occasionally remembers to update his flagship blog at http://albertriehle.blogspot.com.  Finally, he’d like you to know that no animals were harmed in the writing of this bio, but if a spider had wandered across the screen, he probably would have gone medieval on its ass.

Rachel Wallace

Rachel Wallace is a research assistant holding a Master’s degree in biology with a habit of moving every couple years. It would take all her fingers, and most of her toes, to count all the places she’s lived, but she currently resides in Davis, CA, with her husband, two dogs, and one overly inquisitive horse.

Reading has been a lifelong hobby of Rachel’s, with no book safe from her wide-ranging interests. When not reading – which takes up most of her spare time – Rachel is writing, watching sports, traveling, debating the merits of various video games with the above-mentioned husband, or working with rescue horses.

Debbie Suzuki

Debbie Suzuki is a quality engineer working for Adobe Inc. In her free time, she loves to read and blog. Reading has always been a favorite past time since she was a small child. She would spend her afternoons at the library reading or spending time with the librarians. This pattern has continued as she worked in her high school and university library. In 2005, she earned her Master of Library Science from San Jose State University and hopes to one day work as a young adult librarian. Some of her favorite genres to read are historical and paranormal romances and young adult fiction. In 2008, she started her blog, Debbie’s World of Books, http://debbiesworldofbooks.com/. Stop by to check out book reviews, giveaways, author interviews and more.

Leslie  Wolfson

In her first gig as a book reviewer for a city newspaper, Leslie Wolfson was a struggling freelance writer who dared to send the editor a bill for her reviews, and was promptly fired!  This was back in the 80′s when she actually received $50 per review, which was pretty good money in those days.

After giving up freelance writing for about twenty years, she is writing again on the side. (Working with high-risk teens as an English teacher is her day job.)  Leslie has had many articles published in magazines and newsletters (most of them paid) and has also published six children’s plays (also paid.)  But book reviewing is so darned fun, she’s been doing it for free over the last three years.  To warm up, she wrote book reviews for both Children’s Literature and VOYA, where she occasionally saw her byline on Amazon.com. Leslie has moved on, and up, naturally, to Sacramento/San Francisco Book Review.

Having been a writer since the age of six (she “wrote” her first poem at five) she is always working on something having to do with writing.  Her current project is her Y.A. novel, which she hopes to finish first, and publish second.

Amanda Mitchell

Kidnapped by gypsies at an early age and subsequently abandoned by the gypsies, Amanda Mitchell spent her formative years moving cross-country, from Los Angeles, California, to southern Florida to northern Wisconsin. All of these moves taught her what was really important: clothes, toys, even siblings could be replaced once you moved into your new house, but nothing could take the place of a well-loved book. Amanda’s father blames his chronic back problems on the boxes of her books he personally carried up and down dozens of flights of stairs during Amanda’s childhood.

All this reading eventually led to some writing, which eventually led to a weekly humor column for a regional Wisconsin newspaper. (To this day, no one’s really sure how that happened.)  Amanda’s since given up the column, though she still writes from her new hometown of Winston-Salem, North Carolina. And she still reads. A lot. Her favorite books include Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, and Christopher Moore’s Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal.

Amanda’s blog can be found at Non Skweeter.

Heather Ortiz

My mother always told me that I’d been born to a group of traveling circus performers, but as the years went by and I found myself strangely uninterested in being shot out of a cannon, I began to suspect she might be pulling my leg.   I did exhibit some carnival-like freakishness, however, when I began reading at age two, and by the time I was four, it was a common practice to amaze friends and visitors by handing me a newspaper and having me read it out loud.  Then I’d make it disappear into thin air.  When I was six,,I went to my school’s library and picked out my first ever “grown-up” book, The Black Stallion by Walter Farley.  After a brief tussle with the librarian (that stately matron was fully convinced that that book was far above the abilities of a six-year-old) I managed to stun her with my incredible alliterative abilities and a few well-chosen naughty words.  The librarian learned an important lesson about the dangers of trying to balk a well-read six-year-old, and I was allowed to take the book home.  I almost didn’t bring it back.  I was in love.

My childhood was plagued with an infestation of stepmothers (three at the last count) and since the justice system has yet to add “annoying the hell out of me” to the list of offenses that are punishable by severe defenestration, the only place I could escape was into books.  I’m almost positive I read the entire contents of my high school library in four short years.  I even smuggled home Stephen King novels, although Stepmother #2 had expressly forbade them from coming into the house.  College and on-campus living brought a respite and a huge new library to read my way through.  Unfortunately, it also brought the bitter revelation that I was not cut out to be a novelist.  Turns out that writing a novel isn’t all book signings and Oprah appearances and getting to work in your pajamas all day.  Apparently one has to actually also write things down in a comprehensive and logical manner.  Every day!  I spent a week in a despondent funk that involved a lot of Alanis Morissette, a lot of cookie dough ice cream, and not a lot of showering.  But, eventually, I got over it and resumed loving books with my trademark level of ferocious enjoyment.

I grew up in New Mexico, terrorized South California for eight years and am now currently located in North Carolina working as an IT Program Planning Specialist.  Life with my fiancée and our 60 lb Norwegian Elkhound named Loki includes watching a lot of movies (Loki loves musicals), creating my own line of snarky note cards for my Etsy shop, motorcycle rides in nice weather and books.  Books, books and more books!

Lanine Bradley

Lanine has loved reading since she was a small child. Coming from a long-line of school teachers, she had little choice in the matter.  Now, as an adult, she reads approximately one book a day. “Books have always served as my stress reliever. Any time I’m having a bad day, all I have to do is pick up a book. Twenty minutes later, I’m refreshed and ready to face the world.”  A self-proclaimed bibliophile, she recently downsized her personal library from 600 books to her favorite 225. “I had to, we were running out of bookshelves,” she explained.

In 2003, after graduating with a Bachelor’s in Strategic Management, Lanine swore never to set foot on campus again. She recently had to eat her words when she returned to California State University in 2008 to earn her MBA, double-majoring in Finance and Urban Land Development. She anticipates graduating in December of 2010. “Being on campus again as an older student is amazing. I feel I can better appreciate all university life has to offer, such as the awesome art shows or the wonderful guest speakers. I recently was able to catch Henry Rollins when he preformed spoken word on campus. It was amazing.”

Last year she left corporate life to work as a property management coordinator for a small start up company and has never been happier. Lanine lives in Roseville, CA with her two teenagers, two cats, and a Chihuahua/terrier mix. When not working, studying, or manage her brood, she indulges in her passion for coffee, bookstores, movies, blogging, spending quality time with friends, and her dirty little secret–an addiction to reality TV shows. Working on her first novel, Lanine is hopeful to finish early next year.

Jordan Magill

A recovering political consultant, Jordan Magill is an alumnus of both the Squaw Valley and the Tin House writer’s conferences.  In 2010, he will be disembarking to New York with his very understanding wife and their three children, where he has been offered a fellowship by NYU’s Creative Writing Program.

Jordan’s first novel, Who Mourns for Saul?, a retelling of the rise and fall of the first king of Israel, is currently out for reading by publishers.

Kelli Christiansen

Kelli Christiansen launched bibliobibuli professional editorial services in 2007, putting 20 years of experience in publishing to work for individual authors and publishers on a variety of manuscripts as an editor, publishing consultant, and writer. Kelli began her publishing career in 1988 as a bookseller for B. Dalton (part of Barnes & Noble). She served as a journalist and city editor for a chain of community newspapers before becoming an acquisitions editor first at Publications International, Ltd./Consumer Guide and later at McGraw-Hill.

Prior to launching bibliobibuli, Kelli was an executive editor at ABA Publishing (part of the American Bar Association). Kelli has worked on more than 200 books, including several that have won kudos from a number of publications, including The New York Times, Business Week, Barron’s, and Library Journal. Her clients include Amacom, Bloomberg Press, Kaplan Publishing, and Sourcebooks. Kelli works out of her home office in Glen Ellyn, Illinois.

Sheli Ellsworth

Sheli Ellsworth is a free-lance writer and mother of two teenagers who lives in Thousand Oaks, CA. She has a master’s degree in psychology used mainly to annoy family and friends.

Her writing has been published in the Pacific Daily News, the Ventura County Star, BackHome magazine, Auto Week, Zone4 and she also writes Dear Miss Betty-advice for those who need to be slapped for Spotlight on Recovery.

Nicholas Evan Sarantakes

Nicholas Evan Sarantakes is a Bay Area native and a historian.  He currently teaches strategy at the Naval War College.  He has a Ph.D. from the University of Southern California, an M.A. from the University of Kentucky, and a B.A. from the University of Texas.  He has written two books.  His third Allies Against the Rising Sun: The United States, the British Nations, and the Defeat of Imperial Japan comes out in late 2009.    He is currently finishing a fourth book on the 1980 Olympic boycott.  He has published a number of articles that have appeared in outlets such as The Journal of Military History, and ESPN.com.  He has won five writing awards for his article work, and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Although trained as a historian, he has also worked as a journalist.  He was a reporter and an editor for The Daily Texan, the student newspaper at the University of Texas.  Since then, he was written for The Montgomery Advertiser, Austin American-Statesman, The Augusta Chronicle, and the Augusta Daily Metro.  He is currently moving into the world of fiction with an effort to write a mystery novel.  He reviews both fiction and non-fiction for the Sacramento Book Review.

When he is not busy writing, he is trying to improve his modest snow skiing skills.  He has skied in five states, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand.

Auey Santos

Auey Santos is a professional photographer, a voice actress, and a mom of two little boys. She was born in Indiana, but has lived in Boston, Welch WV, Tampa Bay FL, New York City, Chicago, and Pasig City.  She now calls the East Bay her home.  She is a very nice person and likes to smile a lot.

Raised on a healthy dose of Judy Blume and Louisa May Alcott, Auey remembers smuggling books and a flashlight under the covers to continue her reading habit after lights out.  The last time we looked,  she has 12 books on her bedside table, which she reads on rotation as the mood strikes. Fortunately, she’s invested in a bedside lamp. She’s been wearing eyeglasses since she was 10 years old.

Auey loves stories. And she likes to tell stories through her photos. Visit her photo-blog at http://www.aueysantos.com/.

D. Wayne Dworsky

Although he grew up in New Jersey, D. Wayne Dworsky was born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1944. He recognized his love of nature at a very young age. In 1980, he graduated from Herbert H. Lehman College with a Bachelor of Arts Degree and launched his career in education in 1984 by teaching mathematics, which would span 21 years. Between 1983 and 1984, he achieved recognition in the Mohonk Preserve in the Shawangunks as a first-class rock climber, which led to his conquest of the Matterhorn in Zermat, Switzerland in 1985. From 1978 to 1985, he served as editor of the newsletter put out by the Spina Bifida Association of Greater New York. In 1987, he received his Master’s Degree from City College. In 2004, he retired from teaching and began to publish. He hosts a radio talk show on Blog Talk Radio . The show airs each Monday night at 8 pm EDT.  He writes articles for American Chronicle | D. Wayne Dworsky.  Publicity and praise of his fictional stories may be viewed here.  Additional information is available at his full blog

Joseph Arellano

Joseph Arellano is a newer member of the Sacramento Book Review team.   He grew up not far from Sacramento in Stockton, where he received his B.A. in Communication Arts from the University of the Pacific (UOP).  Joseph quit the Pacific debate team in order to thoroughly enjoy himself spinning records for KUOP-FM.  He produced the weekly rock album reviews for the radio station and for the campus paper, The Pacifican.

Joseph moved to Los Angeles for graduate school and somehow never learned to dislike the area (Southern California Book Review, anyone)?  After completing law school, he pretty much decided that he wanted to do anything but boring legal work, and accepted an interesting job with a state agency.  He quickly became entrenched in state service and has worked as a public servant – including teaching in the Criminal Justice Department at Sacramento State – for many, many moons.

Joseph also expresses himself via his blog on which he focuses on books (yes), music (naturally), beer, running, health news, cats and other essentials.  He plans to eventually start a new one, with just book and music news and reviews, which will be located at http://josephsreviews.wordpress.com.  He’s also begun to try his hand at some pre-publication editing work for a technical publisher.

He currently lives in Elk Grove with his wife Ruta and Norwegian Forest Cat, Munchy.  He spends his time being confused about exactly what books he’s supposed to be reviewing, which tends to frustrate Heidi to no end.  What is it Heidi says about supervising the team of reviewers?  Oh, yeah: “It’s like herding cats!”

John Ottinger, III

John Ottinger III is passionate about science fiction and fantasy. A prolific reviewer, he has been posting reviews online and in print since 2004. More recently, he has become a regular contributor to Tor.com, as well as landing gigs reviewing for Publisher’s Weekly, Sacramento Book Review, The Fix, Fantasy Magazine, and the twitterzine Thaumatrope. In addition, he runs his own popular science fiction and fantasy blog, Grasping for the Wind (http://otter.covblogs.com), where he post reviews, interviews, free fiction, and news from the worlds of speculative fiction.

John’s passion for fantasy began at a young age, when his father read him The Hobbit and The Chronicles of Narnia before bed. From there, he graduated to reading work by David Eddings, Terry Brooks, Robert Jordan, Orson Scott Card, Terry Pratchett, and George R. R. Martin. John is glad of the opportunity to review books, as it has brought his attention to many new an upcoming authors, as well as fostered interesting online friendships with fellow bloggers, authors, and publishing industry professionals.

By day, John is a (not so) mild mannered financial analyst, working particularly with non-profits and churches looking to purchase real estate and construct buildings.

When not working or reviewing, John enjoys watching crime dramas on television, playing with his miniature dachshund Darra, and helping out his local community through volunteer service.

Doreen Erhardt

Doreen was raised in the Santa Clara Valley, where she married in 1980.  She embraced a successful fifteen-year career as a Project Planning Specialist and Supervisor at Ford Aerospace Communications Corporation (now known as Space Systems/Loral), until 1994, when she and her husband relocated to the beautiful Sierra Foothills of California-a goal they had worked towards since their introduction to Amador County in 1981.  It is here that Doreen launched her second career as an artist and gallery owner.

She discovered her passion for photography in 1981 when her husband bought her first SLR camera system for their first wedding anniversary.  In 1990, she returned to college, studying both black & white and color photography, completing her education in 1994.

Finally settling into their new life in Amador County, Doreen was invited to join the Left Bank Gallery in Jackson.   From there, she become a co-owner in the Volcano Gallery, and two years later, opened her own gallery; The St. George Salon of Art in Volcano.  For six years, she acted as curator; creating and executing group and solo art shows, creating and maintaining a global presence through the Internet and handling all aspects of one of the gold country’s more prominent galleries. The artist has received more than 50 awards for her art and photography, including being the recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award in the Art and Science of Photography in 2004. Doreen has collectors in the United States, China, Europe, Hong Kong and the U.K.

Wishing to spend more time with her recently “retired” husband of 28 years and her camera, she left the gallery exhibition world in 2005.  Since that time, Doreen has added to her website www.SalonOfArt.com many series and collections to her body of work.

She offers many collections, sets and series that are well-matched for a large variety of markets.  Doreen has created several mock-up product images which can be found throughout the website.  Her focus in 2008/2009 is to find licensing opportunities in apparel, gift wrap, stationery, greetings card and home décor markets; to name a few.

You can visit more of the artist’s work at her other shops. For great casual apparel for the family (including your pets) check out: http://www.cafepress.com/salonofart .  For specialty items, such as; men’s designer ties and Ked’s shoes visit: http://www.zazzle.com/salonofart . For great greeting cards stop by: http://www.greetingcarduniverse.com/salonofart. And for monthly updates on new art and product releases you can swing by http://www.squidoo.com/salonofartnews

Genny Heikka

Genny lives in California with her husband and two kids, where she balances writing with motherhood and loves both. She’s the author of two children’s books (A Trip to the Supermarket and Find the Sea Animals, to be published by Unibooks Education and Publication, Korea, 2010). She’s also an Assistant Regional Advisor for the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and edits a regular column in the North/Central California SCBWI newsletter, The Acorn.

Two of Genny’s manuscripts have received awards, including her middle grade novel, Give and Take, which received Honorable Mention in the 2009 Sue Alexander Awards.

In addition to her children’s writing, her work has been published in the book Kirtsy Takes a Bow: A Celebration of Women’s Favorites Online.

You can find Genny writing at her blog, MyCup2Yours, and at places like Sacramento Parent Magazine, PluggedinParents, HybridMom, 5 Minutes for Faith, and MothersClick.

Some of the things she loves? Coffee, chocolate (or actually any dessert), writing, reading, exercising, the smell of fresh cut grass, sunsets in Maui, hiking in Tahoe, dates with her husband in San Francisco, organic products, any movie or book that makes her cry, sushi, getting up early in the morning, candles, reading with her kids at night, and more coffee.

Megan Just

Megan Just has always been reading fanatic.  As a child, she required weekly trips to the library where she would pick up a new armload of books.  It’s hard to keep track of that many books and, thus, began Megan’s bad record of library fines that continues today.  By mid-elementary school, Megan was animating her toys by writing stories about them, one key at a time, on her father’s old manual typewriter.

Megan began reviewing books for the Sacramento Book Review in March.  At the time, she was living just up the hill from Sacramento in South Lake Tahoe.  Although Megan recently moved south to Redlands, California, she will continue to review books for SBR.  She especially enjoys reviewing books by local authors and books that are so new they have not been released for sale yet.

As a freelance writer, Megan writes for a variety of projects.  She likes screenwriting and fiction writing best of all.  She recently finished first drafts of two different books: one is a contemporary women’s novel, and the other, with some work and time, will be literary fiction.  Megan hopes that someday her fellow SBR reviewers will be reading and analyzing her own books.  You can read Megan’s Just Writing blog at www.meganjust.com.

Allena Tapia

Allena Tapia is a freelance writer, editor, mother and perpetual student. She was born and raised in 1980s Detroit. From an early age, she watched her mother climb out of the poverty of the Brightmoor barrio through books and education. By elementary school, Allena was picking up the novels assigned in her mother’s college classroom, and can still be completely lost in a book-much to the annoyance of her husband and two children.

Allena developed a strong loyalty to Michigan State University when her family moved to the Lansing, Michigan area in order for her mother to complete her education. In high school, Allena discovered that other languages provided the same succor, and she eagerly took up Spanish. She eventually made her way to Michigan State University herself, majoring in English and Spanish. She recalls entire days lost in the third floor stacks at MSU’s library, and curious glances from clerks who would process out 20 books at a time for her.

She began her word-oriented career editing and writing full time for both Michigan State and the local community college, but holds that the University classroom spoiled her. She much prefers to work on her own circadian rhythms, and pursue her own interests. She also enjoys prolonged travel to her husband’s family ranch in middle Mexico, where she can practice her Spanish and write quietly as her children manhandle farm animals and run wild in the village. Because of this, she has found her calling as a freelance writer and editor. She is the managing editor of a regional, bilingual social-justice oriented magazine, and has held contracts with the NYT- owned About.com, EBSCO, Thompson-Gale and M.E. Sharpe. Articles and book reviews have been printed in regional and national glossies, and much of her work focuses on Latino issues and culture.

Allena regards words, linguistics, literature and language study as the “stuff of life.” Recommended reading includes “Love in the Time of Cholera” and Verbatim magazine. Her future includes completing her first novel, visiting the Alhambra in Spain, and someday retiring to Mexico with her beloved husband.

She is available for freelance writing, editing and book reviewing through her company, GardenWall Publications: www.gardenwallpublications.com.

Susan L. Roberts

I have a passion for children’s picture books and have a collection of more than 300.  I’ll go into a library or books store, pull 15-20 off the shelf and spend a delightful hour reading and re-reading new titles and my favorites.  It’s something about the simple, often nurturing, text and beautiful art.  Whenever I’ve had a hectic day at work, I slip into bed with a few of my favorites, and life is good again.

I live in Sacramento, California, have a degree in Business Administration and work in marketing.  I love promotions, so writing children’s book reviews for Sacramento Book Review combines two of my passions.

Cathy Lim

Cathy Carmode Lim has been reviewing books for newspapers for more than 10 years. She was a book-page editor for two of those years, until her recent move to California’s Central Valley area. Her lifelong love of reading, along with her “professional-sounding” status as a book reviewer, has led a lot of friends and acquaintances to ask for advice on books to read or just to start up conversations about good reads. She has been able to be in a couple of book clubs and had even more opportunities to talk about books and enjoy the company. What fun  – books, friends and even tasty snacks or scrumptious desserts!

Cathy runs a website called Rated Reads (www.ratedreads.com) that not only provides reviews of recent books (young adult, middle reader and adult novels and nonfiction) but also gives ratings to the books based on content. Some readers find themselves frustrated on finding a popular book has a whole lot of bad language, vulgarity or sexual content (or on learning that their teen has picked up a book with that kind of material), so the site is a service to give extra information for those who like to “be warned.”  It’s much like the ratings system for movies or television – and information is power.

Cathy is a wife to a physical therapist and mother to four daughters, ages 13 down to 2. Books are in her office, living room and bedroom and in each of her daughters’ bedrooms. She has read with her girls every night since each was little – and still reads with the oldest at least once a week. It’s delightful time spent together.

Cathy has a bachelor’s degree in journalism and works part-time now at the Visalia Times-Delta, laying out a weekly entertainment magazine (which naturally includes book pages). She is working on finding a publisher for a children’s book she has written and is next working on a young-adult book.

Andrea Rappaport

Andrea Rappaport’s passion for food and cooking was sparked early on. While most kids her age were making mud pies, Andrea found herself in the kitchen with her grandmother, who lovingly and patiently taught her to prepare the food of her Eastern European heritage. Andrea also received an early culinary education from her food -obsessed parents, who insisted on dragging her and her brother to every hot, new Los Angeles restaurant.

In high school, she spent much of her free time cooking with friends and, at the age of sixteen, landed her first job at a gourmet food shop, where she was introduced to delights such as cheeses from around the world and pasta made from scratch.

At eighteen, Andrea left home to attend college at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and, while she majored in sociology, she found herself focusing more intently on creating exciting meals for her friends. In her senior year, it finally became clear that she should  pursue a career in cooking. Encouraged by her parents to complete her degree and to get some hands-on restaurant experience before diving straight into cooking school, she took a job at a local restaurant where she found that she thrived on the pressures and excitement of restaurant life.

In 1990, Andrea moved to New York to attend the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) and it was during her stint there that she procured a six-month externship in Wolfgang Puck’s kitchen at Spago in Los Angeles. Upon completing her degree at the CIA, she returned to Los Angeles to cook at Spago and then left a year later to be part of the opening staff of Spago, Las Vegas. Andrea spent two years honing her craft and mastering every station in the Las Vegas restaurant, but eventually felt the need move on.

The next stop on her culinary journey was in San Francisco, where she accepted the position as executive chef of the Italian restaurant Zinzino. In her six years as the chef there, Andrea received sparkling reviews from customers and food critics alike and was named a Rising Star Chef by the San Francisco Examiner. She was also invited to be a guest chef at the James Beard House in New York, one of the highest accolades an American chef can receive.

Eventually, Andrea burned out on the frenetic restaurant lifestyle. She spent a year running her own catering business and then took a full-time job as the private chef for a family in the Silicon Valley, where she has remained for eight years. Today, she continues her work as a private chef and divides her time there with free-lance catering, teaching cooking to adults and children, and consulting. She is also a contributing writer for the website Chef2chef.com and writes cookbook reviews for Sacramento Book Review. Andrea spends her free time enjoying the many wonders of San Francisco, socializing with friends, and immersing herself in her cookbook collection which is more than 1200 titles strong.

Alyssa Feller

Alyssa Feller has recently returned to her hometown of Sacramento after earning a B.S. in English from BYU-Idaho.  She’s loving the sunshine and not missing the cold, snowy weather at all!  She now works as a freelance writer and proofreader while still finding time to do her own writing and blogging (mostly about books!).

Alyssa grew up with a family of readers, and was rarely seen without a book.  Weekly trips to the local library meant all the librarians recognized her and greeted her by name.  Alyssa began reviewing books 4 years ago when her love of reading and writing about books led her to a volunteer position reviewing for a Young Adult book website.  Alyssa loves writing for Sacramento Book Review because it gives her the opportunity to read her favorite type of books (Young Adult) and still discover some great new reads in other categories.

When not reading or writing about books, Alyssa enjoys movies, musicals, and spending time with her family.  When she’s lucky she also gets to take the occasional trip to her favorite place in the world: Disneyland.  You can catch up with Alyssa at her blog: http://theshadyglade.blogspot.com.

Holly Scudero

Holly Scudero has been a lover of books ever since learning to read as a child.  That love continued through all of school, where she was consistently ahead of her grade level in reading, through high school and beyond; in college, she took numerous literature classes for fun, including one on Shakespeare and Bible stories.  That love of books is deeply interconnected with a general love of the English language; a someday English major with an A.A. in Liberal Arts, Holly loves to write short stories and poems.  In fact, a close friend of hers frequently asks her to tell her bizarrely crafted stories to fill spare time.

Currently working for a financial services company in Sacramento, Holly lives in Woodland with her husband in their recently acquired house.  Also living there is her cat, Freddy, a small monster who enjoys playing with his food and water and opens Holly’s dresser drawers when she is not home.  Holly grew up in the Bay Area, where the majority of her family and some of her closest friends still reside.  She volunteers every summer at Two Sentinels Girl Scout Camp and is a lifelong Girl Scout.  Holly belongs to the Davis Women’s Book Club and absolutely loves her side job as a writer for the Sacramento Book Review.

Holly has been a vegetarian since shortly after graduating high school.  She absolutely loves to cook exciting vegetable dishes, and loves it even more when she can sneak vegetables into unexpected places, such as in cakes.  Holly is a bit of a health nerd, actually.  She’s also a bit of a comic book nerd, and a video game nerd.  Well, Holly is kind of a nerd in general, and she wears the title proudly.  She frequently attends comic book conventions and makes a journey to the Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon, every year.

Her favorite genres have traditionally been popular fiction or fantasy, but lately she has been rediscovering a love for classic literature and has found that some chick lit isn’t all that bad.  Her favorite books currently include The Jigsaw Woman and The Time Traveler’s Wife, as well as The Wheel of Time and A Song of Ice & Fire series.

Amber K. Stott

Amber K. Stott joined the Sacramento Book Review as a freelance writer in March 2009. She also writes gardening tales, recipes, book and restaurant reviews on her blog AwakeAtTheWhisk.blogspot.com.

Amber’s award-winning writing has earned her several first-place honors from the Sacramento Public Relations Association. Currently, she serves as the head of fundraising and communications for Women’s Empowerment, a Sacramento-based nonprofit serving homeless women and children. She has raised more than $4 million for nonprofits including WEAVE and Freedom from Hunger, and serves on the board of the California Capital Chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals. She also holds awards for nonprofit event planning.

Holding a Bachelor’s degree in Comparative Literature from the University of Illinois, and from the same university, a Master’s degree in African Studies and Women’s Studies, Amber also received a Fulbright Hayes scholarship to study Zulu. She also speaks Danish, and was a Rotary Exchange Student to Denmark.

Raised by a librarian, Amber is often seen with a book in hand. As soon as she could reach the kitchen counter, she baked regularly with her grandma and bakery-owner aunt. She also picked fruit in the yard to make jam with her dad. Today, Amber tends to five raised garden beds with her husband in Sacramento, California, using crop rotation and organic methods. Her seasonal recipes draw inspiration from the ripe produce in her back yard. Her favorite books include Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver and Comfort Me with Apples by Ruth Reichl.

Alex C. Telander

Alex C. Telander was born in 1979 in Málaga, on the south coast of Spain, where he lived for the first nineteen years of his life, attending an English high school.  He started writing with a vested interest at the age of fifteen with short stories for class and personal enjoyment.  In his last few years in high school, he started his own newspaper, the St. Anthony’s Gazette, where he published some of his stories, as well as a wealth of other material that he mostly wrote for the paper.

Attending Long Beach State, he majored in English: Creative Writing, which he earned a B.A., as well as a minor in history focused on medieval studies.  While in college, he wrote for the independent, student-run newspaper, formerly the Long Beach Union, now the Union Weekly (http://www.asicsulb.org/unionweekly/), first as a staff writer, then as an editor, starting the Literature Page, where his book reviewing first began.  In his last year at Long Beach State, he was Editor in Chief.

Alex C. Telander is a very busy guy.  He has been reviewing books for more than a decade and over the last few years for BookLoons.com and now also working for the great Sacramento Book Review.  He also keeps his own website, www.alexctelander.com, updated every couple of months with his book reviews and other writings, including the “Stream of Consciousness” page.

He is the creator and host of the unique book review and author interview podcast BookBanter (http://bookbanter.podbean.com), which has new episodes on the 1^st and 15^th of every month.  He has already interviewed big authors like Brandon Sanderson, Amber Benson, Dan Simmons, and Bernard Cornwell, with many more interviews planned.  You can check out BookBanter at: http://bookbanter.podbean.com, or search for it on iTunes (http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=293685675).  Check out his Facebook group or send an email to bookbanterpodcast@gmail.com to join the mailing list.

Alex is currently working on what he hopes to be the last rewrite of his mystery/thriller novel, Nothing is an Accident, about a man who wakes up and doesn’t know who he is or where he is, or how he even got there.  He is also working on a comic book series called 1066: a historical account of the Battle of Hastings.  He has already completed a young adult fantasy novel, Kyra, with plans for many more books, including Wyrd, a historical fiction novel set in  sixth century Britain.  With what little time he has left, he spends it reading, reading, and more reading, watching TV, hanging out with friends, and watching his favorite baseball team, the San Francisco Giants, when he can.  Go Giants!

Laura Friedkin

Laura Friedkin lives on the Olympic Peninsula in northwestern Washington state. She and her husband relocated there last spring after her husband took a job as a network engineer for one of the local Indian tribes.

Laura’s a graphic designer, with 20 years of experience, and has worked for printing firms as well as several businesses, doing packaging design for health and beauty aids, pharmaceutical and agricultural products, and sports nutrition supplements. Currently, she is doing volunteer work in her new small-town community and spending precious time with her aging parents, who retired from Illinois to the Peninsula 18 years ago.

Laura is an avid reader and enjoys doing reviews for the Sacramento Book Review, which opens up her viewpoint to reading a wide variety of book genres. There’s a nice perk in getting to choose from a broad number of books, and insures her of a steady flow of books for her reading appetite! She’s been reading all her life and looks at it as a way to keep her imagination vivid and her thought process well oiled. It’s also a wonderful means of escape sometimes.

Having spent numerous vacations on the Olympic Peninsula, there are a lot of places yet to explore, and it’s a far cry from living in the suburbs of Denver, Colorado, where she and her husband lived for 6 years. It’s been an interesting process, adjusting to small-town living, where the population is in the neighborhood of 25,000, after living in a populace of well over 500,000. The pace of life is much slower, the climate more agreeable, and the scenery, profound, with towering mountains and miles of beach to wander.

Meredith Greene

Meredith Greene is native Californian, novelist, and avid blogger.  She has been married for 13 years, works from a home office, and spends much time with her four energetic children. In elementary school, she discovered Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and began reading classic literature in earnest. The urge to write soon after blossomed from an inkling to serious intent, and her passion for poetry and literature did not diminish into college.

Now a writer for BelatorBooks.com, she has authored four fiction novels and is currently co-authoring a historically-accurate fiction series with her husband and fellow novelist Stephen Greene, starting with On the Way to America, a novel chronicling two immigrants coming to New York in early 1909. Seeking to further her professional experience in freelance writing, she began writing reviews for the Sacramento Book Review, and found the experience to be both informative and rewarding; she views such publications to be important venues in encouraging appreciation for the written word. Despite the veritable cloud of literature available, her favorite books remain The Count of Monte Cristo, Pride and Prejudice and My Family and Other Animals.

Mark Petruska

Mark Petruska is in love and wants the world to know it.  The object of his affection?  The Pacific Northwest, where he has lived for the past 15 years.  Born in Hawaii, his father was in the Air Force, and the family moved often.  Over the years, Mark has called many places home – Dayton, Ohio; Rapid City, South Dakota; San Jose, California – but his heart belongs to Vancouver, Washington, where he currently resides.

Mark is also passionate about writing.  In the 8^th grade, he finished first in a short-story contest, and has been hooked on the written word ever since.  When he turned 30, he decided to try his hand at novel writing, and has cranked out four books over the years; he is currently hard at work on #5.

“My dream is to become a published author,” Mark says.  “I’d love to walk into a bookstore someday, and pull a novel with my name on it from the shelf.”

In the meantime, Mark is enjoying the experience of reviewing books for Sacramento Book Review.  “It’s a win-win situation for me,” he says.  “I love reading, and this has given me the chance to discover some promising new authors.  Plus, it’s giving me some valuable publishing experience, which will hopefully help me out when it’s time to pitch my latest book.  I’m excited to be a part of the whole process, and look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Sacramento Book Review.”

Mark is divorced, and shares custody of his two children, Jason and Danielle.  His “day job” is a marketing coordinator for a pressure washer manufacturer in southwest Washington.  Hobbies include cooking, photography, “mind-numbing reality television,” and hiking in the Columbia Gorge.

A bow and arrow-wielding mercenary confronts painful memories and an ancient evil in Return, a new Innkeeper’s World story from the pen of mythopoeia, Hugo and Nebula Award winner and two-time World Fantasy Award best novel nominee Peter S. Beagle. Soukyan, the narrator, has long been hunted by unchangeable Hunter’s triads, but the latest attack is different. Soukyan dons a disguise to return to that place he fled as a boy many years before. What he finds is the ancient secret of the Order of Brothers he was once invited to join.

Only through the help of the magic given to him by the “man who laughs” can Soukyan hope to overcome the indomitable Hunters and their half-mad masters. Beagle’s story reads like an ancient legend due to its intimate first-person perspective, its ancient sounding grammar and vocabulary, and its intense sequences of battle and ancient magic. Coupled with a spectacular cover and interior illustrations by Chesley Award winner Maurizio Manzieri, this lush limited edition novella is entrancing and utterly compelling. Familiarity with The Innkeeper’s Song is not required to enjoy this captivating heroic and mythic fantasy.

Reviewed by John Ottinger

Recovering Apollo 8 and Other Stories collects nine tales by award winning author Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Perhaps best known for her novella of space-faring treasure archaeologists and treasure hunters, “Diving into the Wreck” (which appears in this collection), this compilation shows the unique versatility and consummate skill of this former editor of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. This collection highlights its focus on human relationship, whether in the character-driven alternate history tales of “Recovering Apollo 8” and “G-Men”; the clever urban fantasy filled with wizards and magic of “The Strangeness of the Day” and “Substitutions”; the hauntingly sad “June Sixteenth at Anna’s”; the short but poignant Christmas story of “Taste of Miracles”; the racially-charged tale of lost aliens in “The End of the World”; or the warning tale of “Craters”. Enhanced with an afterword that elucidates the sources and histories of each story, this is a must-have volume for fans of Poul Anderson, Charles de Lint, or any reader interested in exploring that ethereal and elusive creature we call human.

Reviewed by John Ottinger

Judge Sn Goes Golfing is the hilarious chapbook by the Hugo and John W. Campbell award-winning author John Scalzi. Set in the world of his popular The Android’s Dream novel, the story tells the tale of how Judge Nugan Bufan Sn – a selfish and socially awkward but intelligent jurist – goes golfing on the one course still open to him. The notoriously awful Dulles Woods is, a course built on tarmac and designed by a video game player. Scalzi mixes punnery, buffoonery, and satire together to recount a tale that seems to be of a formerly arrogant and selfish character turning to goodness and light, only to twist it on its head in the final moments. Judge Sn seems to be having his best round of golf ever, that is until wave after wave of assassins make attempts on his life, something Judge Sn takes with uncharacteristic aplomb. Though misanthropic, Judge Sn is a compelling character, and Scalzi narrates his simple tale with panache and trademark wit. Illustrated throughout by The New Yorker cartoon contributor Gahan Wilson, this short story is a side-splitting must read.

Reviewed by John Ottinger

In this sequel to the popular epic fantasy The Warded Man, the legend of the hero Arlen Bales takes a backseat as two other characters capture our imagination. There is Jardir, the pseudo-hero and king who leads violent, stereotypical desert folk against the tranquil “green lands.” The rags-to-fame story of Jardir mirrors Arlen’s, feeling repetitious in content and flow, but the latter half of the novel is different enough from what has come before to set it apart from its predecessor. The second protagonist is Leesha, the young, beautiful, no-nonsense herb gatherer who wants love but has difficulty finding it. She must lead the small village of Deliverer’s Hollow through the most trying times the world has seen in thousands of years. Jardir and Leesha have a future that could make them allies or enemies, and it is around this that the plot of The Desert Spear revolves. Arlen does make an incidental appearance where he confronts some of the mistakes and disappointments of his youth. 

The Desert Spear is an earthy, entertaining, and traditional epic fantasy whose greatest claim to fame is the unique setting – where mankind must hide from demons who rise at night–and a magic system of wards that echoes Tolkien.

Reviewed by John Ottinger

But few outside of Robert Heinlein’s devotees know that many of his works were aimed at, and market to, children before they became popular among adults too. Between Planets is one such novel .  At one time serialized in altered format in the magazine Boy’s Life, the tale is bursting with crisp prose, action-adventure, and a dash of romance. The storyline explores what would happen should a young man be caught in the middle of a war not of his making and on which he has no opinion. Would that boy declare for one side or the other? Would he wither away into nothing? Or would he become that rare kind of man, a hero?

The plotting is a bit simplistic in its progress, and the romantic element is underdeveloped, but the story is nonetheless engrossing. Fans of classic science fiction, middle school students, or readers that prefer optimistic endings will enjoy Between Planets.

Reviewed by John Ottinger

In this anthology, editor Esther Friesner has collected twenty-one hilarious stories of werewolves in suburbia. Soccer moms, angst-ridden teenagers, mid-life crisis dads, annoying little boys, and even a hardboiled detective find their way into these very funny stories. Of particular note are: Jody Lynn Nye’s “Howl,” which gives a man in a dead-end job a new lease on life; “Blame It on the Moonlight” by Tim Waggoner, recounts a most unusual first date; Esther Friesner’s “Isn’t That Special” turns the tables on a manipulative soccer mom; “Prowling for Love” by Linda L. Donahue shows that finding love, for a werewolf, is not an easy prospect; Dave Freer’s dwarf detective solves the crime in “Wolfy Ladies”; K. D. Wentworth redefines the term “Special Needs” in her tale, and Jim C. Hines takes a ubiquitous childhood TV show and writes a diabolically funny new script. Strip Mauled cleverly mashes up the funniest aspects of suburban life with the troublesome nature of the wolf. Each of these stories is entertaining and fans of paranormal or comic fantasy will want to be sure to add this book to their collections.

Reviewed by John Ottinger

Sex, politics, religion and magic are the tools of control of the city of Copper Downs in Jay Lake’s memoir-style fantasy. A heroic fantasy with a dash of steampunk, Green follows the story of the titular character as she relates her tale from her first memory of a death, is sold into a life of slavery across the ocean, and her transition into a strong and powerful servant of a goddess. Readers will appreciate that the heroine does not follow conventional norms of fantasy for female protagonists. Green is made a slave, but is also educated, and though taken into captivity to become a courtesan, she is never raped, and in her sexuality is not defined by her gender. Written entirely from the perspective of Green, the novel is probably at its best when she relates the story of her upbringing from child to young woman. Its slow build of tension is akin to the work of Terry Brooks or Robert Jordan. The latter half of the novel, entertaining but less intriguing, follows the standard pattern of a hero who overthrows an evil god-king. Lake’s poetic metaphors and similes and full circle plotting are wonderfully pleasant to read, making this heroic tale one of the best fantasies of the year.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

For this anthology of twenty-four stories, editor John Joseph Adams tasked some of the brightest luminaries of speculative fiction to write stories of vast, galaxy-spanning empires and the people that live in them. From a rare Lois McMaster Bujold short story about the professions that arise in the aftermath of war, to a special Robert Silverberg tale of love and honor, to Anne McCaffrey’s famous ship who sang, to a humorous tongue-in-cheek tale by Harry Turtledove, each of these stories are of the highest quality. All of them do what SF has always done best, and make the reader think and question while still being entertained. Even the relative newcomers like Jeremiah Tolbert, S. L. Gilbow and Georgina Li present tales that are thoroughly polished and pleasingly inventive. By mixing writers with great experience in with newer authors, Adams captures both the feel of the old pulp magazines and the practical elements of the ever-changing science of astronomy and space travel. Though some of the stories are reprints by such authors as Robert J. Sawyer or Orson Scott Card, there is also a goodly mix of brand new fiction by L. E. Modesitt, Jr. and Alan Dean Foster. Editor Adams has collected both the finest writers and their finest tales in the definitive volume of vast, epic, interstellar Federations.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

Award-winning author and professional folklorist Marie Brennan brings together a tumultuous time in English history with its ancient folklore of elfinkind to fabricate a novel that is historical in context and wonderfully fanciful in its content. Set in the period of English history between 1639 and 1666, the story follows the immortal Lune, Queen of the London fae, and her human consorts as they attempt to save England from both mortal and immortal foes. This period of English history was the time of Cromwell, strong Puritan belief, the scourge of plague, and the Great Fire of London that changed its landscape from medieval to modern. Although this novel is a follow-up to Midnight Never Come, it is not at all necessary to have read the first book to enjoy the second. And enjoy it you will, if a complex plot of overlapping schemes, a fae people beset by their own kind both within Lune’s court and without, and a period of English history that is unlike any other it has seen before or since gets you salivating with reading eagerness. You will swallow this book whole, wishing that it would never end. Brennan is a bright new voice in fantasy fiction, and In Ashes Lie is her best effort yet.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

In this collection of fourteen stories, Nebula and World Fantasy Award winner Jeffrey Ford uses his personal experiences to create tales of myth and wonder. From the World Fantasy Award winner “Botch Town,” in which a model city becomes a metaphor for glimpses into a changing world; to Nebula winner “The Empire of Ice Cream (from which the book gets its title), where a person suffering from synesthesia does not know whether what he sees is real or a figment of his imagination; to “The Weight of Words,” in which math is applied to the understanding of words with unfortunate consequences; Ford’s fiction is always very real and very personal. Much of it is born from the his own life experiences-a fact he makes clear in the story notes at the end of each tale. Though there is some repetition of specifics due to this birthing from personal history, each story has a separate theme and a distinct flavor that keeps them all engaging. Ford is not afraid to represent the world as he sees it, so there is drug use and profanity, but these are integral to the story, a means for using concrete, noticeable facts to anchor the more ethereal elements of the story. The only element that seems an additive to some of these stories is Ford’s disdain for Christian belief and tradition. In “The Green Word,” this is especially evident, as Ford could just have easily used a made-up religion in place of the Christian one or could have chosen another belief system entirely. As the story was written for children, it seems this element is more a piece of propaganda for malleable minds than a truly required part of the narrative. The majority of the stories could be labeled urban fantasy, though a couple are set in different times and places entirely. All in all, the stories within The Empire of Ice Cream are well-written, entertaining (albeit it sometimes quite sad), and are worthy of the awards and acclaim they have received.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

In this story of a far-flung humanity, the planet Florina is subjugated by the planet Sark. But when a Spatio-analyst learns that the world of Florina is soon to be extinct, a web of political intrigue that will change the relationship between Florina and Sark begins.

The story itself is small-scale, focusing only on characters and not the creation of an epic. There are Rik, the psycho-probed stranger; Valona, the big millworker; and Myrlyn, the Florinan with a chip on his shoulder for his Sark overlords. The story is primarily a detective thriller set in space, as the three protagonists try to find Rik’s tormentor and solve the puzzle of the end of Florina. The plot is uncomplicated in its progress, though fast-paced and quite entertaining. This is classic science fiction, just as the genre was finding its voice – a voice now defined by much of Asimov’s work. This is a great narrative for new readers intimidated by Asimov’s more complex Foundation novels. As well, those who like uncomplicated space opera that is part mystery and part political thriller will enjoy The Currents of Space.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

In this collection of four novels set in the same universe by a SFWA Grand Master, the author repeatedly reflects on the great clash of civilizations and personal identity. In The Sioux Spaceman, Kade Whitehawk must bring his knowledge of plains culture into the far reaches of space to a subjugated race of aliens that need to remove their shackles. Eye of the Monster forces Rees Naper to run hard and fast in a race to save others from a native race of aliens suddenly turned hostile. Diskan Fentress must use his mutant powers to stop space pirates from destroying a culture they cannot understand in The X Factor. Voor is afflicted by a plague called the Shadow Death in Voorloper and it is up to three survivors to solve the crisis. In each of these narratives Norton creates grand worlds of strange delights and bizarre civilizations. At the individual level, each protagonist must work within the strangeness of the world to find who he or she is as a human. Norton makes the tales of this collection both sweepingly epic and extremely personal, providing the reader with wonderfully grand visions and significant emotional connections to people not so very different from us, even across the vastness of space and time.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

In this collection of four novellas, four women whose fantasy writing repeatedly tops the charts return to their worlds to tell stories about women with strength of character. Each tale presents a different facet of feminine heroism. In the humorous urban fantasy “Zen and the Art of Vampirism”, Kelley Armstrong’s vampire protagonist plays tour guide to Toronto’s paranormal side. Kate Elliott returns to her Crown of Stars epic fantasy series with “Riding the Shore of the River of Death” in which the heroine finds there is more to life than being the wife of a tribal chieftain. C. E. Murphy twists a traditional Russian fairy tale about Baba Yaga’s daughter in “From Russia, with Love” into a yarn about love and knowledge. The world of Farseer gets a new narrative in Robin Hobb’s “Words Like Coins” in which the protagonist learns respect for others. Prior knowledge of the setting is not necessary for any of the stories, and each is a good starting point for entering the worlds of these acclaimed authors. Each of the four tales is finely wrought and thoroughly entertaining.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

In this retrospective of Wolfe’s short fiction, the author himself chooses the works that he considers to be his finest ever. In a career spanning over thirty years and many Hugo and Nebula awards, that is no mean feat. Wolfe showcases his trademark first person perspective of the unreliable narrator in each of these tales, including three of his famous “Island” stories, the genre breaking “Hero as Werewolf”, the SF detective mystery “The Detective of Dreams”, the haunting “A Cabin on the Coast”, and the prophetic “The Fifth Head of Cerberus”. Old fans will find much to enjoy in this collection, and newcomers who have enjoyed works by Peter Beagle or Charles de Lint will devour its pages.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

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This Norse mythology-based novel is much like the Renshai novels of Mickey Zucker Reichert in its premise. In All the Windwracked Stars, the Valkyrie Muire has abandoned her brothers and sisters to die on the battlefield of Ragnarok. Forced by immortality to live through the age of man, she lives long enough to see a second apocalypse approaching. Guilt over her cowardice at the first ending leads Muire to do what she can to stop the second apocalypse from occurring, putting her in conflict with the Technomancer and Mingan, the Grey Wolf who swallowed the sun and tarnished Valkyrie.

Vampire-like sex, the heaps of introspection and a hard-to-clarify power struggle mar this otherwise creative novel of rebirth and redemption. Characters spend a great deal of time in introspection and evaluating their relationships, making this yarn less of an action story and more of a voyage of self-discovery and melancholy musings in a dying world. This story has the same emotional effect as George R. R. Martin’s Dying of the Light. I recommend the read, even for the action-centric fantasy reader – Bear makes it worthwhile.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III

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