Five is a coming-into-her-own/paranormal romance novel written by Christie Rich. As Rayla Tate is just beginning to figure out who she is and what she may want out of life, she also finds that life and the fae may have alternate plans in store for her.

When I first began reading Five, I wasn't a fan. Christie Rich was incredibly detailed and descriptive when giving the reader as much of the back story as possible, without giving away any plot twists and turns that may be in store later on. While those are typically both good things to have in a novel, they just seemed to make the first few chapters sluggish and slow-moving. However, I later found myself reflecting back on every "sluggish and slow-moving" detail as I read-on.

Once the momentum picked up, it kept up a steady and engaging pace throughout the rest of the book. I found myself hanging on every detail, every description...essentially, everything that had irked me in the beginning now had me hooked. Christie Rich's characters are very relatable and emotionally well-developed. She also has an ability to describe a setting and make you feel as if you are actually there, right next to the characters. I found myself experiencing the emotional ups and downs right along with Rayla as her life unfolds before her.

In the end, I found that I didn't want Five to end. In fact, I have to keep stopping myself from going back and checking the end of the book...just to make sure I didn't miss anything or there wasn't more to read that I somehow over-looked. For me, that's the sure sign of a truly great book, when it has the ability to get its hook in me so effectively that I convince myself there is more there, that I missed something. I know one thing; Christie Rich has made a fan out of this reader. And I know where I'll be, on the edge of my seat, waiting for the next "Christie Rich novel" to be released.

"Love should be the great leveler: The thing that obliterates all other emotions into the insignificant rubble they are." Rayla Tate, Five, written by Christie Rich, Chapter Sixteen, page 170
(I was given a copy of this book to read and review.)

Terri Reid has created the most likeable characters I have ever "met." I love how she crafts her books to include mystery, paranormal, romance, humor, fully developed main characters, secondary characters, plots, subplots, etc! Her attention to the fine details of each area and how they all intertwine and come together in the end is truly a talent. You will never be able to pick up one of her books and figure out how it's going to end before you get there! There are so many twists and turns and surprises, you'll be amazed where it ends up! I love that in a book!

Thorn is a tattoo artist that just happens to be a witch. She is the only tattoo artist that can tattoo vampires, because of her healing magick. When her supernatural customers start to turn up dead, Thorn becomes the #1 suspect. She is the last person to see them alive. Se, a detective investigating the murders, has an instant attraction to Thorn and trys to help clear her of the murders. Thorn will not only need her own magick but the magick of her dead grandmother and the help of her loved ones. This book has a good story and has great flow. The book pulls you in and you want to keep reading. Thorn is a strong female that has been on her own for a long time. Se, is a strong male character that has gentlemen qualities which you don't see too much in male characters, he's just a genuine good guy. There are secrets with all the characters which makes the story even better. Everyone has their own agenda.

Bloodstone, the second book in the Stacy Justice Mystery Series, begins right where the first book left off. I highly recommend reading the first book in the series in order to understand the previous sequence of events and understand the family dynamics. However, it does start off with the last scene from the first book, which is a great refresher, not that I needed it. Even though it has been a while since I read the first book, the surprise ending really stuck with me! The pace is fast, mysteries and secrets abound, and it is both suspenseful and hilarious at the same time! The situations Stacy manages to get herself into are so funny and she is quite resourceful and quick thinking. I loved the excerpts from Ivy's journal! I am very glad about who Stacy eventually chose to be with and I can't wait for the third book! Love this series!

This is a pretty fair niche mystery. I don't know that it adds too much to the genre, and it's not the most original story I've ever read. But it was a quick, easy read, and it had its moments where it was rather fun.

This was one of those strange books that I enjoyed while I was reading it (for the most part), but the second I put it down, I was struck by its flaws. (Literally. I opened the computer, ready to give this a better review, but the second I started to type, I thought, "Wait...") The characters are well-written - at least overall. The material pertaining to Wicca seemed pretty accurate. And the mystery wasn't terribly obvious (though the real core of the book isn't really the mystery but the relationship between the characters and the heroine's journey of self-discovery).

However, there were a few little things (and one or two big things) that bothered me about the novel. I don't think these are spoilerish, but I suppose they might be. For example...why the strange focus on the fact that the main character needs only one hour of sleep a night? To make the readers jealous? I suppose it could be the author's attempt to demonstrate how "powerful" she is - after all, there's a good deal of focus on how much energy she has, and that she has always turned to other non-magical ways to get it out. Only it doesn't seem like the other witches have a similar issue, so it's just Katie. She's so incredibly powerful, you see.

Don't get me wrong; I expected her to be a powerful witch. You don't pick up these books to read "The Adventures of Mediocre Katie and Her Much More Awesome Friends." That said, she shows up in town, everyone loves her - or comes to respect her (except a couple of bad guys, perhaps). She's quite possibly the best baker who has ever stepped foot in a kitchen. She has two hot guys fighting over her. She's an insanely powerful witch who just makes everyone else more powerful by her presence. She's so powerful, in fact, that she can't even sleep because of the sheer amount of POWER in her. I don't know. I guess it was just a bit too much for me.

Which is not to say that I didn't enjoy Katie's character. I did. I just wished that some things were toned down a bit. It veered a little too close to Mary Sue territory for me.

I did enjoy most of the supporting characters, with the sole exception of Steve. I truly loathe Steve's character. Words cannot express how much. My intense hatred for Steve comes down to one thing: "Katie-girl." I don't know how many times he calls her that in the books (short of "almost every darn time he refers to her"), but if I had this on my Kindle, I'd count up the number of times. Just so I could imagine punching the character in the face for each and every instance.

There was just something so PATRONIZING about that particular nickname. Particularly in one instance, where he stresses the second half of the nickname. "Katie-GIRL." In the context, it came off even more patronizing than the nickname normally does, and my general dislike for him (based off my irritation over the nickname) fell somewhere around "deep disgust" level. I can't see him as "hot" - as he is so constantly described - and I don't understand why she's supposed to be attracted to him. Hmmm...an apparently genuinely good guy (who is also, might I add, not described as having fallen out of the ugly tree to hit every branch on the way down) or the patronizing jackass? Tough call, Katie! I can totally feel your dilemma there! </sarcasm>

The other big issue I had with the books had to do with Katie's parents. I don't really want to give a lot away, but...Katie's a powerful witch, but she didn't realize it until some early point of this book. As I think one can assume from the basic plot, her powers can be dangerous, even inadvertently. She particularly needs to be careful because she's SO powerful - and her mere presence is enough to intensify spells and the like - that she has to watch out for black magic.

I don't want to go into spoilers, but if you've read the back of the book, you know that her aunt is a witch. Mildly spoilery: her mother, at least, probably suspected (and likely knew) she was a witch as well. Now, if that's true...wasn't it incredibly irresponsible of her parents to hide their knowledge about Katie's abilities from her? If they realized how she had "inadvertently" likely cast a spell that made her miserable as a young child, we're to believe...what? They just looked at her and went, "Sucks to be you, baby. Be careful what you wish for." I mean, really, their child was only miserable and alone; it couldn't possibly be their problem or their concern. They just sat back and figured to heck with it; the odds of her doing something similar again (or worse) were probably not that good? And if she's so powerful that she needs to be careful of black magic, they figured...well, there's no way that complete ignorance of what could happen could go badly for her, so it's best to keep quiet?

This is the thing that drives me crazy about this sort of story. Particularly when it's not a question of "we don't know if you have this ability, but nothing we've seen has ever indicated you even might, so we kept it to ourselves." It makes the person who kept the secret seem highly irresponsible at best and a complete and utter jerk at worst. (Yes, the word I'm thinking in my head is much stronger than "jerk.")

I do understand that it's the construct of the story. It's more fun if you're there with the character from the "beginning" so to speak, from that moment her powers are discovered. The problem is, the way this author constructed the backstory to justify her ignorance, I have nothing but utter disgust for her parents, and we haven't even really "met" them yet.

I did enjoy this book when I was reading it, but these issues really spoiled my enjoyment of the story overall. I actually didn't know who the murderer was for quite some time, which is nice as I hate it when the solution is obvious from the moment the murderer is introduced. I do think that the stories have some potential. I may even pick up the next book (particularly if it's titled "Hexed Steve Dawes Becomes a Ferret"), to see if I change my opinion about her parents or any of the above. I think this is the author's first book, and it is actually a fairly solid first effort. Unfortunately, this particular book also has enough flaws to spoil my enjoyment of the story, once it was finished.

I loved the book, it was a great read. I found myself laughing out loud and getting misty-eyed in a few places. Always a sign of a good book for me. A couple of problems for me though ~ one big, one small. First, the small: whoever transcribed this book and/or proofread it, needs to get a different profession. Massive typos, syntax errors and missing words. But that can be overlooked because the story was so very good. Now the big: the ending. Really??!!! A bit anti-climactic don't you think? I was really shocked it just - ended! At first I thought something was wrong with my Kindle Fyre. But to my shock and dismay, no ~ it really was over. After the previous action packed chapter, it was like Ms. laMee just got tired of writing and said "I'm done"! Definitely left me hanging and wanting a little tidier ending. Hope there's a sequel.

Kate McGuire divorced her wealthy politician husband and set up a photography studio, slowly gaining business over the past year. Deciding to try something fun, she joins a parapsychology group at a local college. It's entertaining, until she gets a vision of an angry man strangling a young woman - a vision that is so vivid that she feels as though she is the one being strangled. After the professor running the group - Martin Carver - checks the registration on the item Kate was holding, it is discovered that it had belonged to a young woman named Kelly Landrum, who has gone missing several days before. Venice Ashburton, a professional psychic, receives a similar vision. When Kate refuses to go to the police, Venice decides to take matters into her own hands and contacts John Gerrad, a reporter, who meets with Venice and Kate and then mentions them in an article about the missing girl. While Kate is upset about people finding out she is involved with a psychic research group because she is afraid it will negatively impact her business, what she should have been concerned about was what the killer would think when reading the article - because now the killer thinks that Kate and Venice know more than they do - and plans to do something about it ...

Ellis Vidler has created a very well-crafted mystery/suspense in "Haunting Refrain." Several good suspects are kept in the mix through the book and while I did figure out whodunit, I wasn't absolutely sure I was correct until the denouement. I was also impressed by the fact that, up until the end, the heroine was shown to be pretty sensible, taking the advice from the police and from Gerrard for her own protection. Of course, then she did go and do something stupid ... but it was a necessary part of the plot to move things forward properly so I'll let it go. It was just refreshing to have a heroine that was willing to listen to reason and behave in a somewhat logical manner as far as protecting herself went, once she realized she was in danger. I also liked the fact that Ms. Vidler did such a good job at giving each of her characters such an individual voice - having recently read a book in which all the characters sounded the same, it was nice to see this done so well. Overall I was highly impressed with this book and fans of mystery, suspense and/or thrillers should love this book. Definitely check it out.