Book Review: Lazarus by Maryanne Melloan Woods @maryannemwoods @owlhollowpress @RockstarBkTours

 

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I am thrilled to be hosting a spot on the LAZARUS by
Maryanne Melloan Woods Blog Tour hosted by Rockstar Book Tours.
Check out my post and make sure to enter the giveaway!

 About The Book:

Title: LAZARUS

Author: Maryanne Melloan Woods

Pub. Date: September 8, 2020

Publisher: Owl Hollow Press

Formats: Paperback, eBook

Pages: 230

Find it: Goodreads, Amazon, Kindle, B&N, Kobo, TBD, Bookshop.org

 

Margo and Hank are two teens in tiny, god-forsaken Lazarus, Nebraska. They have a profoundly deep relationship; the only hitch is that Hank has been dead for two months. Somehow he has remained in limbo— no doubt due to the sheer force of their love, and unfinished work to be done.

 

When the pair get tangled up investigating the latest local murder— with Margo doing the everyday detective work and the late Hank spying on suspects unseen—they discover nothing and no one in Lazarus are as they seem. The investigation becomes more dangerous, and it’s up to Hank to protect Margo—as much as a ghost-bodyguard boyfriend can. While clinging to each other, the teens uncover the sinister secrets of the people they’ve known all their lives, reopen the cold case of Margo’s mother’s death, and learn how to face their past—and how to move on.

 

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A teenager and her ghostly boyfriend solving crimes is an appealing premise and, with dollops of humor and a whodunnit atmosphere, Ms. Woods makes it work. Margo and Hank can’t help being a bit mired in sadness since Hank isn’t really alive and well but the two work well in tandem, perhaps even more efficiently than other detecting duos. After all, a ghost can go places and hear things that a living person can’t, right?

It’s not Hank’s death that they need to investigate but there’s a lot going on in Lazarus including a very unexpected murder and perhaps another one in the planning stage. Also, Margo has dealt with death before, seven years ago when her mother was murdered and her killer was never caught. Hank and Margo have their work cut out for them to discover some hard truths while trying to find their way back to a semblance of normalcy even if that means another loss.

Lazarus is a fun, quick read and is a nice way to while away a few hours; there’s nothing like a good ghost story when Halloween is just around the corner 🙂

Reviewed by Lelia Taylor, September 2020.

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About Maryanne:

Maryanne Melloan Woods is a novelist/ screenwriter/
playwright currently living in the New York area. She received a B.A. in Theatre Arts from Drew University and an M.F.A. in Screenwriting from the American Film Institute in Los Angeles.

As a TV writer/producer, Maryanne has written shows for
networks including Showtime, NBC, ABC, Fox, the WB, Nickelodeon and ABC Family.

 

Maryanne’s plays have been produced by HBO’s New Writers Project, the Mark Taper Forum, and many theatres around the country. Maryanne has won the New England Theatre Conference’s John Gassner Playwriting Contest and the Venice (CA) Playwrights’ Festival. She also received a playwriting grant from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. Her play, Smells Like Gin, was the first play produced by Writers Theatre of New Jersey, and she recently won “Best Comedy Script” in the Nashville Film Festival’s screenwriting competition for her screenplay Steve.

 

She has taught screenwriting at the Gotham Writers Workshop in New York, UCLA and the American Film Institute, and served as a panelist for TV writing seminars at NYU and the University of Wisconsin. Maryanne was also a
mentor/teacher for The Unusual Suspects, a playwriting workshop for at-risk teens in L.A.

 

Maryanne is represented by Liza Fleissig of Liza Royce Agency.

 

Website| Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Goodreads

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Giveaway Details:

2 winners will receive a Finished Copy
of LAZARUS, US Only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Tour Schedule

Week One:

9/21/2020	BookHounds Ya	Excerpt
9/22/2020	YA Books Central	Excerpt
9/23/2020	Oh Hey! Books	Excerpt
9/24/2020	Lifestyle of Me	Review
9/25/2020	The Phantom Paragrapher	Review

 

Week Two:

9/28/2020	Infinite Lives, Infinite Stories	Review
9/29/2020	Smada’s Book Smack	Review
9/30/2020	Buried Under Books	Review
10/1/2020	A Gingerly Review	Review
10/2/2020	Rajiv’s Reviews	Review

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Book Review: Dragon Justice by Laura Anne Gilman

Dragon Justice
Paranormal Scene Investigations #4
Laura Anne Gilman
Harlequin, July 2012
ISBN 978-0-373-80348-4
Trade Paperback

From the publisher—

In my time with PUPI, formally known as Private, Unaffiliated Paranormal Investigations, I’ve seen a lot. Learned a lot. And not all of it’s been good. But what we do—make people accountable for crimes committed with magic—is important work.

Still. Even I need to take a break every now and again. Or so I’ve just been told (ordered).

So hey, vacation. Maybe I’ll finally figure out what’s going on with the “special bond” between me and the boss man, Benjamin Venec. Venec seems to like that idea—he’s invited me down to join him on a jaunt to Philly. But no sooner do I arrive in the City of Brotherly Love than we’re called in to look at a dead body.

And that’s when life gets really complicated….

I first “discovered” the world of Cosa Nostradamus and the good folks from Private, Unaffiliated Paranormal Investigations a few months ago, meaning that’s the first time I read one of the PUPI books although I’d known about them and other works by Laura Anne Gilman for quite a few years. I’ve regretted the lost time but my procrastination does mean there’s a lot for me to enjoy before I have to join the hapless many who wait impatiently for each new book.

The one I read last March was the third in the series, Tricks of the Trade, and I intended to go back to read the first two but we all know what happens to good intentions, don’t we? So, here we have book number four and a wild ride it is.

Life is never exactly what we would call “normal” for Bonnie and the rest of the Talent she works with, that is, a handful of  humans with  magical abilities who fight magic-related crimes. To do this, they have to keep their skills away from the notice of Nulls, those poor humans who have none, and always be on the alert for the misdeeds of the fatae, supernatural creatures. Bonnie has been ordered to take some vacation but her boss, Ben Venec, has invited her to help with an outside job at a museum in Philadelphia and, the next thing she knows, she’s in the thick of the search for a truly vicious serial killer as well as trying to figure out why young girls have been living in a park in New York City. A very large side issue involves money and Ben’s partner, Ian Stosser, with some deadly collections efforts.

Bonnie and Ben finally give up their fight against a mutual attraction but the romance in this particular book is kind of lightweight. I’m not actually sure if that disappointed me but I think maybe not. It was enough to lighten the mood a bit but the investigations are too important so I can wait for the romance to develop more in future books. Some very dark things happen in Dragon Justice and it will be interesting to see where Ms. Gilman takes us next.

One of my all-time favorite dark fantasy characters, the well-to-do Great Worm known as Madame, is once again an important element and I loved visiting her along with Bonnie. Wouldn’t you love to have a dragon friend in your corner, especially one with such good taste?

Reviewed by Lelia Taylor, November 2012.