The Bones Will Speak by Carrie Stuart Parks

This is my first experience with Carrie Parks and, of course, it is the second book of a series.


How much have I missed?

Right off the bat I realize there's history: we have a policeman casually discussing some strange things with an, I'm assuming, eccentric lady who has found a human skull.

This book felt like I was reading one of those crime procedural tv shows. (take your pick, they're all the same) Parks has some experience in this so the story moves along in a realistic way.

I'm not much of a CSI/Criminal Minds fan so I don't have much frame-of-reference to tell you as I review this book.

I thought it was smartly written, the characters were enjoyable. I'm sure Parks is a talented author. Some of the religious themes weren't too overhanded and things did pick up speed quite a bit near the end.

These books are fairly difficult to review without giving anything away.

I would recommend this book to the fans of those tv shows as you're provided a first person perspective and discovering the clues/trying to solve the case right along with the character. Can you solve it before anyone else?

This book was provided for review, at no cost, by Thomas Nelson Publishing.

The First Family Detail by Ronald Kessler

Part tabloid junk, part behind-the-scenes intrigue. This book provides some shocking surprises about some of our presidential families.

Right off the bat, Kessler writes about President Bill Clinton's current mistress and some of the adjectives used to describe her (from agents no less) bring to mind a kind of tabloid-like junk read.

But then you get into the actual chapters and some of the stories get more interesting. Who knew that President Carter was such a phony? Who knew First Lady Barbara Bush was like the mother hen to the agents?

Stories from Johnson, Nixon, Carter, up to Obama and even Mitt Romney are covered by current and former agents. This I found interested as Kessler states and the beginning these agents are supposed to have signed a type of non-disclosure agreement. (So much for that oath)

But this isn't a hit piece. This isn't political in any way outside of a revealing of how Presidents and their families treat the Secret Service agents. The REAL purpose is to shine a light on how lax the Secret Service management has become. Kessler spends a great deal of time outlining how porous the security measures are.

Lots of fun information about our Presidents and their families plus scary implications of what MIGHT happen because the security has gotten so loose.

This is an entertaining read.

This book was provided for review, at no cost, by Crown Publishing.

Fury by Steven James

Fury is book two in James' young adult trilogy.

It picks up with Daniel who was suffering from, what he calls, blurs in the first book. While he may have solved the case from the first book, he finds himself suffering from additional visions and someone who is poaching the local wolves.

It's up to Daniel and his friends to unravel another mystery.

Steven James knows how to create tight mysteries. Most of his stories start off at a slow simmer. I thought this book was almost too slow. The speed really picks up once we get to the psychiatric ward and it does not let up until the last page - no joke. But it does take a bit of work to get there.

There are many threads involved - many storylines that, somehow, all connect by the end. It's amazing to watch James bring it all together. There are so many characters that you THINK you have it pegged on as the villain and then he whips your head around so fast with the answer.

I have enjoyed these books: Blur and Fury. I'm eagerly anticipating the final book. However there was a moment/scene where I was jolted out of the story and almost quit reading. It comes near the end and it involves a hay baler.

I don't know what it was - my mindset or how it felt like a shock jolt to the rest of the story but I thought it was too much. Details were surprisingly absent and it is left to the reader to imagine what happened. So maybe the problem lies in my own head.

That one scene aside, I cannot believe how James can churn these stories out. They almost feel like a young adult combination of his crime-solving Patrick Bower series with his scientific-exploring Jevin Banks series. As if they meshed together and produced Daniel Byers....huh, just noticing James seems to have a thing for characters with last names starting with "B".

Must look deeper into that!

This book was terrific and provided for review, at no cost, by Skyscape Publishing.

Broken Gods by Gregory Popcak Ph.D.

So we are supposed to become gods. This is the theme for Dr. Popcak's book and he bases it from the passage in Psalms and from when Jesus quotes it to his peers. This alone will cause many Christians to not darken its pages.

Popcak spends three chapters setting the stage and preparing the reader for his interpretation of spiritual maturity or deification as he calls it. Then he dives into seven "divine longings" every person has.

These longings include: abundance, dignity, justice, peace, trust, well-being, and communion. Each chapter unfolds how one can satisfy these longings.

Floating around these longings is Popcak's acronym COAL which stands for Curiosity, Openness, Acceptance, and Love. He uses COAL as an application for each longing as you are instructed to ask yourself questions, and practical tips for practicing positive reactions.

This is a fairly good book. I write "fairly" because I still cannot get past the premise of God wanting humans to become gods. It's a difficult theme to lay aside as I read about the common longings you'd hear in a sermon on Sunday.

The science and psychology interwoven throughout the book is interesting and adds a compelling flavor to the overall experience of this book.

This book was provided for review, at no cost, by Image Publishing.