Survivor of the Clan by Jennifer Ott

Survivor of the Clan

By:  Jennifer Ott

Publish Date:  September 10, 2016

Published By:  Author

Genre:  Suspense, Thriller, Futuristic, Science, International

Pages:  242 Kindle Edition

Source:  Jennifer Ott

A roar of motorcycles disturbs a peaceful congregation leaving church on an Easter Sunday outside Edinburgh Scotland. One of the motorcyclists assassinates geneticist Dr. Kyle Locke, while another abducts his daughter, Shelby Locke witnesses her entire life taken from her in one instant. When clues arise that lead to Odessa, Ukraine, it is Shelby who steps up the search to find her daughter and her husband’s killer.

Arriving in Odessa offers more questions than answers. Confronted with the suspects, Shelby must face her own past, as a child, and that of a mysterious woman whom she has recollections of a precarious time in the near past.
In order to save herself and her daughter, she must find the courage and compassion to face issues that plague mankind and its future, only then can Shelby and Amelia be free.

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Welcome to my review of another of Jennifer Ott’s books, Survivor of the Clan!

Check out my featured post to the right for my previous review for Desperate Moon, one of the author’s previous books and foray into all things Euro vampire and just well-rounded story telling.

Survivor of the Clan is her latest publication where she takes on our current human condition from an ancestral DNA perspective, and I’ve never read of a MC (Shelby Locke) profession of being a doll maker so for me these are different themes than I usually read about. This also brings in more than one layer to the meaning of the word ‘clan.’

So through Shelby’s brave journey to find her abducted daughter, Ott plumbs interesting concepts such as whether our human DNA carries memories from our ancestors and even bygone emotional responses to our environment that may not necessarily be beneficial to us anymore as times have changed, a lot! I also really like that Shelby’s story is very current with stuff that’s happening in our world right now such as the take that human life is being detrimentally orchestrated by powerful global companies.

Even though there’s a scientific basis to the story, Ott’s writing has a warm, almost homey feel often focusing on the food and cultural traditions of the Ukraine and the importance of family that ultimately lure Shelby away from what she believes to be her  best interests. The need to know about our family roots is ever a strong one for us all, good and/or bad.

Survivor of the Clan is also a story about Shelby’s own search to find her origins as she is an adoptee. This is really the primary plot that intertwines with her finding her kidnapped daughter who has been taken to the Ukraine where Shelby finds her own mysterious and somewhat frightening birth roots. During this journey, she is led down some terrifying and unspeakable paths.

Steady pacing and new revelations keep the story moving and the reader engaged, and the ending reveals some very unexpected surprises that Shelby learns on her path to discovering her origins. I really liked how the ending isn’t like a perfect cut and dry, comes with some violence, but we are left with upbeat, hopeful feelings for Shelby.

Fav quote:  “When you share eyes, you share a soul.” At 6.3/488

Some minor typos.

If you like to savour stories that delve into the very substructure of human make up and make you think about where your own emotions and thoughts are coming from, be sure to pick up Survivor of the Clan, an interesting and thought-provoking read that presents the reader with fascinating possibilities. 4.3 stars!

You will find Jennifer Ott on the internet at these links:

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Nostalgic Rain by A.S. Altabtabai

Nostalgic Rain: Galaxies Away

By:  A.S. Altabtabai

Publish Date:  July 1, 2017

Published By:  Author

Genre:  Fantasy, Young Adult

Pages:  324 Paperback, 329 PDF

Source:  Xpresso Book Tours

What seventeen-year-old Leland finds in the abandoned basement of his house is something he will never forget.

Leland lost his father when he was seven. Since then, he has successfully adapted to the awful life of being a student, the man of the house, and a father figure to his two younger siblings. All of that changes when he and his best friends stumble upon a secret in his deserted basement, and fall into another dimension with three moons, foggy woods, and an ancient castle-Oremanta.
Learning who he really is, how he came to this remote planet, and the shocking, ugly mystery of Oremanta aren't as bad as the quest he finds himself obligated to complete-killing someone he never thought he'd meet in Oremanta to save everyone.

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Stories that transport readers to other worlds are so interesting; they take you away from the known, a definite reason why I read. Leland gets a soul call to return to Oremanta, a land he didn’t realize is his birthright, and ends up being transported there with his good friend, Jennifer, and also apparent schoolmate Dylan through a portal in his own basement.

But Oremanta is preparing for war, the great castle, the domed areas, and renegade outposts, all.

Leland starts out the novel a sad teen so this adventure ultimately is good for him I think as he completely transforms into a fierce warrior. His character development is gradual and well done. There is also a great twist about Leland’s family that entwines him into what’s happening now. The beginning is a bit slow but the pace of the story then goes well dipping between Leland and Jennifer’s POV/experiences as they separate for some of the book as Jennifer is steered towards becoming a ‘healer.’

I didn’t get a sense of what Leland and the other characters actually look like. This leaves a sort of disconnect for me. But we do get good descriptions of their feelings so you’re rooting for them. Overall the author might have spent more time fleshing out scenes rather than quick moves to new action.

Nostalgic Rain is somewhere between a little bit of a gory Middle Grade style and thoughtful YA with a mix of both straight up monster and battle scenes sometimes and interesting, thoughtful observations/insights at others.

Page 210

“It’s haunting how a person can be so greedy and honorable at the same time.”

Page 230

“Healing is all about your emotions and how you control them. The better you control your feelings, the better healer you are.”

Some unanswered questions at the end so we wonder if the author is going to write part 2. Dylan’s story could be really interesting.

Overall, Nostalgic Rain reads a little younger than I was expecting but is an entertaining if not somewhat bloody MG-YA adventure tale.  Good debut effort. 4.1 stars!

Get Your Copy at Amazon!

Find the author on the internet at these links:

Author's Book Website | Goodreads | Twitter 

Day Moon by Brett Armstrong

Day Moon (Tomorrow’s Edge Book 1)

By:  Brett Armstrong

Publish Date:  March 26, 2017

Published By:  Clean Reads

Genre:  Young Adult, Futurist, Fantasy, Christian

Pages:  389 Kindle

Source:  Ultimate Fantasy Books

In A.D. 2039, a prodigious seventeen year old, Elliott, is assigned to work on a global software initiative his deceased grandfather helped found. Project Alexandria is intended to provide the entire world secure and equal access to all accumulated human knowledge. All forms of print are destroyed in good faith, to ensure everyone has equal footing, and Elliott knows he must soon part with his final treasure: a book of Shakespeare's complete works gifted him by his grandfather.

Before it is destroyed, Elliott notices something is amiss with the book, or rather Project Alexandria. The two do not match, including an extra sonnet titled "Day Moon". When Elliott investigates, he uncovers far more than he bargained for. There are sinister forces backing Project Alexandria who have no intention of using it for its public purpose.

Elliott soon finds himself on the run from federal authorities and facing betrayals and deceit from those closest to him. Following clues left by his grandfather, with agents close at hand, Elliott desperately hopes to find a way to stop Project Alexandria. All of history past and yet to be depends on it. 

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Right away I get the horrible feeling that I’m looking at a very near future scenario that I definitely do not like. Physical books are being done away with by powers that be after being entered into an online repository. Then I realize that this is actually sort of happening to me right now as I haven’t read a physical book for probably two or three years. On one hand it’s great not having to lug heavy hard copy around but where is this possibly leading us?

In Elliott’s slightly future forward world we discover to a not very good or even safe place that is subject to manipulation by those that hold the keys of control to such online repositories. At the moment it seems impossible that our currently self/boutique-published works and even the vast world literature on the incredible Project Gutenberg digital library might ever see such a fate, but reading Day Moon has made me wonder.

After realizing the gift his grandfather left him on his passing is more than just a revered Shakespearean tome, Elliott, John and Lara somehow are forced together to embark on a dangerous and mysterious trail of clues on the road to finding the truth about Project Alexandria. We see themes of near future technology, cyber security, secret codes, mysterious clues, upper level forces that are orchestrating lives in the background, and faith. I thought the idea of electromagnetically controlled mostly self-driving cars fascinating though pretty awful, but then I’m a rebelliously independent type who dislikes even just the digitization of cars.

Elliott and Lara begin a sweet relationship that nevertheless is not all smooth sailing, especially as they are besieged by dangers from the beginning that bring on suspicion and distrust. Lara has a mind of her own but is by nature very supportive.

There were a couple of good twists that I didn’t see coming that take the story down some unexpected paths.  The pacing of the story is very even and while the ending leaves us at the bridge to book II, I didn’t feel wrung out to dry, but hopeful for Elliott’s continued quest. He’s pretty brave and at least willing to take a stand against what he sees as wrong-doing even if it pits him against powerful forces.

Overall I found book 1 in the series very intriguing, if somewhat too even-headed in writing style/pace, but readers will relish Day Moon for its near future scenarios that pinpoint pitfalls of what may be coming our way if we don’t pay attention. A great clean read. 4.4 stars!

BIO

From an early age Brett Armstrong had a love for literature and history. At age nine he combined the two for his first time in a short story set in the last days of the Aztec Empire. After that, writing’s role in his life waxed and waned periodically, always a dream on the horizon, till he reached college. At West Virginia University he entered the Computer Engineering program and spent two years pursuing that degree before an opportunity to take a creative writing class for fun came along. It was so enjoyable he took another and in that course he discovered two things. The first was the plot for a short story called Destitutio Quod Remissio, which the others students really seemed to love. The second, he realized he absolutely loved writing. For him, it was like the proverbial light bulb coming on. In the years since, describing that epiphany has been difficult for him but he found the words of 1924 Olympian Eric Liddell are the most eloquent expression for it: “God made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure.” God gave Brett a passion for writing, and so feels His pleasure when writing.

After a few years passed, Brett got his Computer Engineering degree, but also completed a minor in each of his real passions: history and creative writing. In 2013, he began graduate school to earn an MA in Creative Writing. During that time he completed the novelization of Destitutio Quod Remissio and entered the 2013-2014 CrossBooks Writing Contest, which won the contest's grand prize. As of March 2015, Brett completed his MA and is presently employed in the West Virginia Division of Infectious Disease Epidemiology as a programmer analyst.

Brett lives in Saint Albans, West Virginia, with his beautiful wife, Shelly. In the summer the pair garden together, and each day Brett continues writing his next novel.

Get Day Moon at Amazon!

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