Slap Happy Fun Time

The Cuckoo's Calling - Robert Galbraith 3/5 stars                                                                                       It has to suck being J.K. Rowling. Sure, the money's pretty decent, but after writing the Potter series where do you go? The fans are expecting another kid series, and the non Potter fans want to see her fall on her face in a big steaming pile of failure. I've read one Potter book, and have yet to read Casual Vacancy so, I can be pretty fair and balanced when it comes to this book. There are some fans I'm sure who were pretty upset when they realized that the first Cormoran Strike novel was their beloved Rowling writing under a pen name, and came out in droves to protest her second adult novel. With the pen name, she got a little breat...

Presto!: How I Made Over 100 Pounds Disappear and Other Magical Tales - Penn Jillette 5/5 stars                                                              I received a copy of this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Problem was, I had some tablet issues, but once they were resolved I couldn't find the book anywhere. I did manage to find it and here is my review of Presto!      If you're looking for a how to book on dieting you're going to be disappointed by Jillette's book. What we have is the story of a fat fuck (his words not mine) suddenly losing over a hundred pounds, and not a book telling you how to do it because the way in which he did it is batshit insane! I wasn't looking to lose weight anyway, so that part doesn't bother me, but I w...

The Grave Tender - Eliza Maxwell 5/5                                                                              I received a copy of The Grave Tender from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review and I have to tell you it's not at all what I expected. The story is about lies, secrets, and the lengths one man will go to protect the people he loves. It's a powerful debut that's well written, and packs one hell of a punch at its conclusion. Eliza is a decent writer that pulls us along slowly until the secrets of the Dixon family come pouring out. It all starts with one missing child, and then the story picks up and we're thrust into Hadley's nightmare. This is a family who knows tragedy, and at times it almost seemed like it was too much. Could this really happen? In the end, it didn't re...

 A Perfect Circle Of Contrary Things - Maynard James Keenan & Sarah Jensen 4/5                                                                                                                 When I first heard about this book I was skeptical. For years Tool was a band that kept their private lives strictly that. You didn't see them on magazine covers, or even giving interviews. The fact that Maynard had agreed to tell his life story was mind blowing as well as intriguing. The downside is that the book itself is only written with Keenan which gives it a unique style. It's an interesting glimpse into Keenan, not Tool, so if you're reading the book to gain lyrical insight you're going to walk away...

Big Little Lies - Liane Moriarty 5/5                                                                                                               At the core of Lies is a mystery. We know something bad happened at Trivia Night, but what? As I read this I knew I was in for something special, a book that you simply don't read, you become absorbed in it. There's a lot of detail, and thought placed in the plot which moves at a steady clip. What makes the novel so interesting are the characters. These women are larger than life and you begin to feel an attachment to them. They each have their own crisis, their own secrets which becomes the glue that holds everything together. There's an explosion coming, you can fee...

     The Memory Box - Eva Lasko Natiello 2/5 stars                                                             There are a lot of books on my tablet. Way, way too many and the Memory Box was a book I had stumbled upon, but just never read. It seemed promising, so I began to read it, and then I began to question my judgment. Caroline is sucked into Googling herself, and finds that there are only three hits, but then she Googles her maiden name and that's where the fun begins. Things quickly unravel, and she finds out that she's forgotten some very important parts of her life. These are things no one should forget. I instantly wanted to stop reading because I didn't like Caroline all that much. As a character, she's weak, and boring. It's the way she reacts to things that annoyed the hell out of me. She volunte...

 Let's Go Play At The Adams' - Mendel W. Johnson 4/5 stars                                                                 This is one of those books that always end up on someone's top ten list of great horror novels, but I could never get my hands on a copy. One look at the going price for a battered uses copy is insane. Is this book really that good? I was on my library app and saw that one of the libraries my local branch partners with had one so I put a hold on it and waited for it too arrive. I would soon find out if all the hype was truly deserved.        As soon as it arrived, I ran to the library and with shaking hands, I opened up the cover. This was the moment I had waited so long for but what if it didn't live up to its reputation? Books do that sometime, and it's always...