Posts tagged Free
Posts tagged Free
Title: The Way Life Was Forever
Author: Carey Corp
Number of Pages: 37
Publication Type: Short Story
Download Date: June 20th, 2012
Summary:
Lyra has been brought up to never go out in the daylight—in fact, her entire community stays locked in their vaults all day, only daring to set out at night, long after the dreaded “sun-dwellers” have gone to their rest.
Don’t dally outside: the doors will be locked and you’ll be left to the sun-dwellers, who will eat your flesh straight off your bones…
Lyra had never even thought to stay out, but when her sister wanders too far, Lyra stays out too long to find her, and instead finds Perseus… a dreaded Sun-dweller? Nor does she quite fit his idea of a blood-drinking Moonwalker…
Star Rating: 3/5
Thoughts:
The moral of this story is horribly, terribly obvious. Don’t follow anything with blind faith! Keep questioning, you have more in common with your enemies than you know! People are people, etc.
The romance element here was quick and a little forced, and a little… unnatural. It seems unlikely to me that someone, having been raised to one strict standard of beauty (which we know is rigidly enforced in both camps—sundwellers and moonwalkers alike) could so quickly and easily adapt to another one. Also, instant attraction doesn’t seem to me to be a very good base for running away together and leaving everything they’ve ever known behind.
The ending was a little too feel-good as well. Everyone lived and was happy! They are building a new society where everyone is valued and beautiful! Huzzah!
Also, I have to say… forming a new society in the forest doesn’t seem like the best solution. We never find out why the people were separated in the first place, down all those years ago, and it rankles with me that rather than trying to go back and convince people to open up a bit, they instead… do nothing and just hope everything will one day turn out alright.
Short, a bit overly simplistic, but a quick short read that should keep you entertained during a commute or something.
Download? Yes
Title: Party Favors
Author: Aubrey Watt
Number of Pages: 16
Publication Type: Short Story
Download Date: June 20th, 2012
Summary:
Irina is the beautiful assistant of the most boring man at the ball—er, business gala affair. Rather than deal with snobbish, unattractive people she doesn’t know, beautiful Irina sneaks off into the host’s library. There, she catches a waiter also taking sneaking a break—and when his equally gorgeous buddy-waiter shows up with some cocaine, things really take off.
Star Rating: 4/5
Thoughts:
Do you like reading about slightly melodramatic sex? If you answered yes (and, really, who would answer ‘no’?) then this book is the book for you!
While nothing here is exactly revolutionary, there are two hot guys giving a beautiful woman all she could want, or stand. She orgasms like six times in sixteen pages, does drugs, and then practically waltzes out of the room because she’s just that awesome.
Sure, some things are a bit unrealistic: dresses are hard to put on, especially fancy ones, and I find it a little hard to believe that she could take hers off, do a lot of messy things with fluids and whatnot, and just slip back into the thing with NO ONE THE WISER. But, you never know.
Also, as a fair warning to all, this story doesn’t mention protection of any sort. Then again, the main character also snorts coke she got from a stranger, so I think it goes without saying that this story is literally just for the purposes of wish fulfillment and clearly not a how-to.
It’s short, it’s fairly to the point, and it’s kind of the perfect fantasy for everyone who’s ever been to a dull party where they don’t know anyone: bored? Don’t worry! Here are two dashingly attractive (and attentive) gentlemen in fancy waiter-evening wear and a bag of cocaine just to brighten your evening!
Download? Yes
Title: Inspector Zhang Gets His Wish
Author: Stephen Leather
Number of Pages: 43
Publication Type: Short Story
Download Date: May 20th, 2012
Summary:
In Singapore, there are no unsolved murders. There are very few murders at all, and Inspector Zhang’s one greatest desire is to solve a “locked room” murder mystery. Based on the title, I think you can guess what happened.
Star Rating: 4/5
Thoughts:
Murder mysteries! I like murder mysteries, and the opportunity to say things like, “Murder! Murder most foul! !!!” and so forth. On the plus side, the inspector is as large a fan of that kind of stuff as I am. He’s positively thrilled by all this, and I can get behind that aspect of his personality.
However, I could not get behind the story nearly as much. It dragged. The best thing about locked room mysteries is, typically, that you’re trying to outguess the detective. Unfortunately, this is pretty hard to do here.
The author bogs down the story with the main character’s own sense of the import of the moment. He even goes so far as to explain the six most common reasons/theories of solving the “Locked room mystery”.
Nevertheless, this was a pretty fun read. If you can guess the outcome before it’s revealed, +10 points for you!
Everything taken all together, however, it was a good waste of a little bit of time. It’s fun.
I didn’t much care enough for the writing to invest in the free chapters that came with this story, but the story was alright.
Download? Yes
Title: LZR-1143: Perspectives
Author: Bryan James
Number of Pages: 56
Publication Type: Short Story Anthology
Download Date: June 20th, 2012
Summary:
Based in the modern United States, LZR-1143 follows the first opening moves in a zombie outbreak through the eyes of individuals: a female army sniper, a fast food fry cook, a teenage boy, an airline pilot. And so forth. No explanations are given, and there’s a lot of confusion.
According to the description, these stories follow incidental characters in the author’s two novels in the LZR-1143 universe. I find that a bit difficult to believe, because the characters all die at the end of their stories. Sorry for the spoiler there.
Star Rating: 3/5
Thoughts:
These stories are alright. I’m still interested in Zombies, but the market is pretty saturated right now. I’ve gotten to the point where gross descriptions of zombies eating people doesn’t make a story for me anymore. I’m still a little shocked by it if it’s particularly gruesome, but I need more in a story to get into it.
This anthology is heavy on the gore, light on the rest of the things that make a good story. Most don’t have enough plot to really carry them—the plot is that there are zombies in this story too! Wow! And they’re eating people—gross!
Even when characterization did start to shine through (and I think the author tried), it was a bit… stereotypical. The Army Sniper who Loves Her Daughter, for example. It’s fairly garden variety characterization.
If you love zombies, download this. It is full of zombies, and you can have fun reading about them eating people. Also, it does pose a few interesting thoughts, like… when there’s a zombie outbreak on the ground, where do the air traffic controllers send their planes?
If you don’t like zombies, however, there isn’t really anything else to recommend these stories, and you should skip ‘em.
Download? Skip.
Title: Real Lies
Author: Liana Brooks
Number of Pages: 7
Publication Type: Short Story
Download Date: June 20th, 2012
Summary:
A rescue diver tells the story she can’t put in her report: how, one time, when she went out to cut a body loose from the kelp, it wasn’t some poor drowned beach-goer or murdered yacht princess: it was a mermaid.
Star Rating: 2/5
Thoughts:
The story is very anecdotal. It reads like what it’s supposed to, I guess: some telling you about something that once happened to them. It’s not always the best format for a fiction piece, however, and even though I love stories about crime and stories about mermaids, I was let down by this story that combines the two.
It just didn’t have much punch, much vigor. I was looking for a gripping read, and this just didn’t deliver. As a note, I’d have to say that describing everything in great detail while avoiding the one thing the reader wants to know about does not always build suspense. Sometimes it just bores people.
Nevertheless, the story is readable, and entertaining for a moment. As the song goes, “If you don’t expect too much from me, you might not be let down.” It could help a few stops on the bus route pass, if nothing else.
Download? Meh.
Title: Baby Bonanza (Silhouette Desire)
Author: Maureen Child
Number of Pages: ~300
Publication Type: Novel
Download Date: June 20th, 2012
Summary:
Jenna is only aboard this luxury cruise for one reason: to find millionaire cruise line owner Nick Falco, show him photos of the twin four month old boys he fathered, and demand that he chip in child support.
She’s not here to have fun.
She’s not here to get swept off her feet by a man she still loves.
She’s not trying to win back his heart, or anything. She doesn’t need him, and the boys don’t need him: just some money. That’s all.
And then Nick and Jenna spend a lot of time being angry and sulky and feeling WILDLY PASSIONATE FEELS that they heroically keep to themselves for their various reasons, and the author never lets us go two pages without reminding us how physically attracted they are to each other.
And then at the end they get engaged because really they ARE in love after all! And they’re going to be a family! Yaay!
Star Rating: 2/5
Thoughts:
Once again, if you’re into this kind of book, then you should download this book. Right away. Because this is a very “romance” romance, and that’s all there is to it.
Basically, this is 300 pages that could be solved in 30 if everyone involved was honest and talked about their feelings. Instead of just assuming everything and putting all kinds of words into other people’s mouths. And jumping to conclusions. There was a lot of conclusion-jumping in this book.
It did make me feel things, though: frustration. There were plenty of times where I thought of slamming my Kindle down and storming away (I didn’t! Kindles are fragile and it’s not the ereader’s fault anyway). Because it was just that frustrating.
And, once again, what’s the major lesson this book taught us? Wanting to have sex with someone is the essence of love. If you want to fuck him more than you’ve wanted to fuck anyone else, YOU ARE IN LOVE. Welcome to happily ever after, the all-sex, all the time station!
Really? They have twin boys, book. There is going to be a lot of diaper changing and 3am feedings and barf and little kids wanting to crawl into bed with you and not a lot of time for sex. Just saying, I predict trouble down the line for this marriage.
Plus, the leading man is a jerk. He buys a house without even asking her; also a puppy. And then he’s like, “YOU MUST OBVIOUSLY BE PLEASED WITH MY GRAND ROMANTIC GESTURE, NEVER MIND THAT I REALLY JUST LIFTED MY POCKET BOOK AND I DIDN’T ASK YOU EVEN AT ALL WHERE YOU’D LIKE TO LIVE, OR EVEN IF YOU’D BE ALRIGHT MOVING OUT OF THE HOUSE YOU HAVE.”
Nick Falco. Asshole.
Also, it clearly says that Jenna called and emailed him several times a week for a year, trying to tell him about her pregnancy and the birth of their sons. He says he deleted the emails unopened, and the voicemails unheard. I get the voicemails, but the emails?
If I ever accidentally got pregnant and the father wasn’t returning my emails, the subject line would start to say things like “YOUR BASTARDS ARE AT SIXTEEN WEEKS BECAUSE I AM PREGNANT, YOU ASSHOLE”. (Technically, bastards is correct here. Also, I’m sure most unplanned out of wedlock children are loved and cared for and that “bastard” is an archaic, judgemental term.)
I would make it really, really hard for him to avoid the issue. Also, I would have found a lawyer willing to take their fees out of the settlement and SUED HIS ASS long before our children were four months old. Trust me, Nick Falco is a millionaire; I’m really sure some lawyer would take the case. The settlement would be great.
Also, we have basically the same inner conversation again and again. Jenna keeps reminding herself not to be in love with him, and then she keeps seeing him looking smexy, and then she keeps reminding herself not to be in love with him… rinse and repeat. Jenna, we get it: he’s hot and great in bed, but he’s also the man who ignored all your calls and emails, missed your entire pregnancy AND the birth of his TWINS, and is probably even at this moment being a dismissive asshole. Get over it!
As for the actual sex… there were only a couple sex scenes, and most of them were in flowery language that made it difficult to tell what was going on. If you like romances but hate sex scenes, this might be a good book for you!
And yet, once again… I have met people who enjoy romances. If you’re capable of looking at this situation and seeing it in a romantic light, then by all means, download this book!
Otherwise, don’t. Just don’t.
Download? Nope. (Unless you love romances and hate female independence!)
(That last part was unfair but I’m only a little bit sorry.)
Title: Opt-Out
Author: Steve Umstead
Number of Pages: 19
Publication Type: Short Story
Download Date: June 20th, 2012
Summary:
Harrison Lumberpond just wants to do a good deed and maybe impress his wife when he signs up to be an organ donor via his social networking site (which is totally not Facebook). However, Harrison, like so many of us, failed to read all the terms and conditions… and he forgot to opt-out of one very important feature.
Star Rating: 3/5
Thoughts:
I called this a mile away. I don’t really want to completely spoil it for anyone who wants to read it, but if you’ve seen “Repo: the Genetic Opera”, you know what the little term he forgot to opt-out of was. Or you have a pretty good guess, anyway.
Given how little there actually was to the story, I actually think it was a little long. Either lengthen the ending scene, or lessen the build up; the end was very abrupt.
This has a lot of standard speculative fiction aspects: cold, unfeeling government agents, the perversion of humanitarianism (he just wanted to help someone out after he was dead!), the pitfalls of not reading the fine print, etc. The main character was a nice enough fellow, but utterly forgettable.
I feel this sums up the story, too: a nice enough story, but utterly forgettable.
At the end there’s a link to the authors other books (A trilogy and a couple of novellas, I think) and I am sorry to say that this story had the opposite effect of the one intended: I am going to stay clear of those books, so as to avoid a nice enough, but utterly forgettable time.
This short story, though, by itself, is a fine enough way to waste a little bit of time.
Download? Sure
Title: The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge
Author: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Number of Pages: 70
Publication Type: Novel (Novella?)
Download Date: May 28th, 2012
Summary:
The great Sherlock Holmes is hired to clear the name of a man accused of a murder (he claims) he did not commit, and meantime solve the mysterious disappearance of the murdered man’s house servants… and explain an enigmatic note written in code the dead man tried to burn.
Just another week as a Consulting Detective and his companion/biographer, Dr. Watson.
Star Rating: 4/5
Thoughts:
Far from my favorite Holmes mystery, but good for a fun diversion anyway. Suddenly, VOODOO!
In any case, the fact that this did not get 5/5 is due entirely to a formatting… error?… which put only two words on every other line. I assure you, it was a most irritating way to read. Sherlock is in fine form, however, with his high-minded nearly-poetical lamentations of boredom and charmingly patronizing manner to his dear Watson.
Download? Yes
Title: Tag Team
Author: Nicola Marsh
Number of Pages: 26
Publication Type: Short Story
Download Date: June 20th, 2012
Summary:
They’re as alike as can be while still being total opposites; Australian special forces, brought together to stop a terrorist plot to put Ricin into the water supply of major Australian cities. And then, while stuck in a safe room while their headquarters is being attacked by the terrorist group, Coralee and Fox have sex to pass the time. No joke.
Star Rating: 2/5
Thoughts:
I am sick and tired of STRONG WILLED, FIERY FEMALES who, none the less, NEVER LET THE MAN FORGET THAT HE’S A MAN.
In the end, it’s Coralee’s VULNERABILITY and FEAR that eventually put Fox over the edge, so he fucks her to get her mind off the fact that they might be exploded in a terrorist attack in four minutes.
What? Just, what? What? She finds SHELTER IN HIS STRONG ARMS and so forth. He also makes her FEEL LIKE A WOMAN.
Don’t worry, folks! Despite being a CRACK MILITARY OFFICER, she’s still A FEMININE WOMAN UNDER EVERYTHING.
What? What’s wrong with her just being KICK ASS AND AWESOME? Why do they have to harp on her EMOTIONS BEING HER WEAKNESS?
‘Well, of course they are, she’s just a woman after all!’ <— the moral of this story.
My outrage (and the inconsistent message) aside, the sex is pretty average. Rough enough, fairly well written, but not exceptional. Despite the fact that Coralee mentions more than once how much it’s blowing her mind, I didn’t see anything to make me reread a line twice.
However, I will say that if super sexy women (with a D-cup. I hate to say it, but a SWAT woman with D-cups could be in trouble. Breasts are heavy, ladies and gentlemen, and if she was going to be running around she would probably want to invest in a breast reduction before she snapped her ligaments) spitting out military facts and talking about guns turns you on, YOU SHOULD READ THIS STORY.
There is so much gun-porn and military-porn, aside from the sex-porn, that it should make it worth your while if you’re into that.
On a side note, I don’t know that much about Australia, but I wouldn’t have pegged it for a hot terrorist spot.
Download? Nah.
Title: The Law of Large Numbers
Author: TK Kenyon
Number of Pages: 27
Publication Type: Short Story
Download Date: May 28th, 2012
Summary:
The Law of Large Numbers dictate that, if you wisely play your cards, you will win more Blackjack hands than you lose on average. It looks so, so easy… But it’s really only a foil before the more complicated questions of faith vs math, what is doctrine, and what can be done about it.
Star Rating: 5/5
Thoughts:
I loved the cynicism in this. The mixture of bitterness with intelligence, back story with the present, is hypnotic and beautiful. The emotions in this piece shine so brightly and fiercely that it really jumps out at you.
It is well written, well paced, well characterized. It is, in short, well done. It makes such topics as the invisible dark matter of the universe accessible and understandable. And, most important to most people, interesting.
Good stories make for short reviews: get this ebook.
Download? Yes!