Never Say Die

Nick Thrasher is the product of his Mother's dalliance with a white
Southerner but he identifies with his inuvialuit Grandfather Jonah. The
main action of the book occurs when Nick goes rafting down the Firth
River in Northern Canada with his older half-brother Ryan Powers, a
Nature Photographer for National Geographic. This is a short easy
action-packed read aimed at young-adult readers that packs an
environmental message.

In Too Deep

By Kathryn Shay

In Too Deep is an extremely popular book title. The Romance Genre is a major employer of hunky models though most wear far fewer clothes. No word on whether this one actually fights fires or just lights them.

A pair of fire-fighters trapped in an enclosed space and running out of oxygen do the deed. He’s her captain. After all that hot action the rest of the novella is about what happens after their rescue.

A very different type of fire story from Larry Brown’s On Fire and not just because this one is written by a woman who is not a fireman.

Fearless

Coming of Age, Coming Out, Gay Romance has become a genre so littered with poorly written semi-biographical prose it has become a mine-field of angst and tortured emotion. Finding an entry into this genre that is original and well-done is refreshing. Yes the storyline is totally predictable and telegraphs every plot twist but the characters come alive on the page--well tablet screen--so vividly one doesn't mind; this is not a murder mystery. The authour evokes the high school experience with such realism I felt like a teenager again. The way the book ends it seems to be setting one up to buy a sequel.

On Fire

 

 

Larry Brown’s novels are salt of the earth tales of the common man written with great sympathy and care for his subjects and remarkable realism. In writing about himself he is no less candid revealing a red-necked good ole boy who smokes, drinks and drives, and keeps his wife waiting while he goes out with the boys. He enjoys hunting and fishing and appears to have a careless accident prone streak. As a fireman he is equally dismissive of the dumb things people do and laughs at the discomfort of a facilities manager who sees him smash $1500 windows to ventilate a fire. Fireman in their gung ho desire to knock down a fire have been known to cause more damage than the fire itself.

This is a memoir for Larry Brown aficionados. It is by no means great literature. Episodic and disjointed in nature it jumps from personal details and opinions to biographical vignettes to fire tales in no organized order. 

They Met at Shiloh

Phillip Bryant’s book is not your everyday Civil War story. It personalizes the war following the human journey of an artillary battery and an infantry troop from opposite sides of the engagement. The last major war fought by troops that lined up and fired on one another the cost in human life and mysery is incalculable. Compared with cruise missiles and drones launched from vast distances and sniper rifles that can shoot from a mile away this war was up close and personal. A don’t shoot until you can see the whites of their eyes kind of war.

Yes there are battles but as we switch back and forth between North and South, Union and Rebel it is the human touch that assumes importance. Waiting for coffee to brew. Looking for the bodies of missing comrades, burial details, camp life,  bravery and cowardice. A wounded or dying man knows no side nor does he care from whence cometh his aide. The common soldier supports his unit; the cause matters little in the long run. The man he kills is not all that different from himself. In this war they may even have been neighbours. In death and injury they rest together.