Those who know me as an author will most likely associate my name with science fiction and fantasy. While those genres are my mainstay, I also have a lesser known affinity for tales of espionage, crime drama and mystery. The key factor that draws me to all these types of stories is their speculative nature, and the propensity to keep me thinking. A good book will keep me thinking long past the minute I finished reading the last page. Citizen One by Andy Oakes is such a story.

Any book that contains murder, particularly some kind of serial killing, has to be outstanding to draw my attention. Citizen One drew my attention due to its setting. The murders take place in The People's Republic of China.

The view of communism I've been most exposed to, via life and literature, was the type of cold war fear engendered by the USSR, the KGB, East Germany, The Cuban Missile Crisis and the Arms race. In truth, I know very little about everyday life in communist China, though this book has increased my knowledge immeasurably. It is often difficult for authors to explain cultures or conditions in a place, without detracting from the tension in a story. In Citizen One, Mr. Oakes uses the setting to create further tension, introducing me not only events and customs that are part of Chinese culture, but also the atmosphere of living and working in such an environment.

I can't believe I'm about to write the following sentence. Stephen King's latest doorstop of a novel, Under The Dome, is ponderous, predictable and, worst of all, boring. And this is coming from one of the biggest Stephen King fans on the planet. Heck. I even read From a Buick 8 and liked it, but this latest forest killer is just plain awful.

Not only was this bad, but I think it's broken me of my automatic purchasing of Stephen King novels. I had no idea what Under The Dome was about. I just ordered it because I love his novels. When it arrived, I discovered its length and the fact that this was a book he'd tried to write many years before and I began to get a bad feeling about it.

Turns out, my bad feeling was fully justified. Let's start with the most noticeable thing; it's length. This puppy could have been put to bed at a third of the length if it weren't for the fact that Stephen King loves his characters. He stuffs the book full of them and lets us know the backstory of almost every single one of them. And, not only that, he also documents just about every second of every day that the New England town of Chester's Mill spends trapped under an unexplainable (to them, but not – unfortunately – to us), invisible and impenetrable dome.

Ready for another tale from Blossom Street? This story is complete with cameo appearances from past characters including Lydia from A Good Yarn and Susannah from Susannah’s Garden.

Twenty Wishes focuses on a group of four widows. The widows meet in Anne Marie’s bookshop on Valentine’s Day (talk about depressing) but they manage to squeeze a little hope out of the day by assembling lists of twenty things they would like to do before they die. Being a widow makes you kissing cousins with death, so they are all aware that life is passing them by…much more than most people.

Anne Marie Roche, the bookstore owner, is disturbed that her husband died before they could resolve their troubled marriage and before she ever had a child. It really doesn’t look like there is much left in her life, especially when the two things she wanted was to be loved and have a child…and that ship has definitely sailed. Still under the advice of her friend, Elise Beaumont, she begins to volunteer at the local school and is paired with Ellen, who is just as needy as she is, if not more so. Anne Marie’s first response is to explain to the counselor why the two of them might not be a good match.

There is an old adage that tells writers to show, not tell. Generally, that’s true. Show me the confrontation rather than have the neighbor of a friend of a spectator tell me about it. At the beginning of The Front Porch Prophet by Raymond L. Atkins, I was unnerved by the amount of detail that I was getting; I feared that Mr. Atkins was committing the literary sin of information dumping, giving all the back story and relevant information in one broad stroke at the start. But I was wrong, and happily so.

While I’m used to books that jump right into the action, The Front Porch Propheteased me into it by first introducing an interesting cast of characters from Sequoyah, Georgia. The storytelling matches the slower pace of life in this fictitious town. The details are meant to be savored and life enjoyed. The meat of the book isn’t the characters that Mr. Atkins introduces you to in the beginning; they are the ambiance and backdrop that makes this story richer. So, what is the story?

It isn't often a book is so poignant that it brings me to tears, but D.J. Wilson's Flight to Freedom did. Beautifully written, it had me riveted from the first page.

This is the story of Montana Jeffers who murders her husband, Harland. She knows what she's done; she doesn't deny it. She killed him because she thought he deserved it and now she's prepared to suffer the consequences.

When Montana is arrested and taken to jail, it hardly registers that Phillip Kane, a tax lawyer whom she has met previously, is going to represent her defense. In any case, she hardly cares. What defense has she? As far as Montana is concerned, she is 100% guilty.

When I was younger, like most girls, I loved horses. I grew up in Kentucky, smack in the middle of horse-country, but despite that I never owned a horse or even learned to ride. And that’s why I picked up Death by Dressage by Carolyn Banks. The adult me likes mysteries and the little girl inside just wanted to play with the horses.

Death by Dressage follows Robin Vaughan, the plucky, talkative heroine and amateur sleuth, as she investigates the death of one of the most hated women in Austin’s horse community: Veronika Ballinger. The rich and powerful Veronika loved to find what bothered someone the most and rub his or her nose in it, just for fun. That means that just about everyone who knows horses in Austin, and possibly beyond, had it out for her. Except for one little thing: the police believe that it was all an accident; that she was kicked by one of her horses. But if this were true, why did the police arrest Robin’s best friend Lola Albright?

Genre fiction used to be pretty simple to figure out. These days with so many niche genres, its hard to categorize something that simply does not fit neatly. This can be both a boon and a source of frustration: a boon because writers are deliberately seeking out new ways to express old ideas; frustration because they can be harder to find in the context of overwhelming available choice. Never in the history of humankind have there been so many writers, books, and sources for entertainment.

Act of the Saints goes beyond the usual 'sit back and enjoy' mode of entertainment. This book draws you in, makes you cringe, cry, and even gasp in horror. Not the horror of slashes and massacres, the horror of devious mental games that can be played upon humanity.

I haven't been exposed to an intergalactic romance since Star Wars, so when Alliance: Galactic Affairs landed in my mailbox I was in for an education. I never knew casual sex, including the occasional threesome, was so common in space. I know that cute Luke Skywalker would never do such a thing, but Lyndi Lamont's characters certainly do and what a fun time it is!

In Alliance: Galactic Affairs, the universe is awash with underground encampments and bands of raiding ships, but that doesn't stop Erok from trying to turn a pretty penny by stealing anthropological artifacts. Unfortunately, his antique spaceship falls prey to the destructive whims of Maradon, who renders him helpless in mid-space. Lesson learned. Never piss off a goddess.

Autobiography or autobiographical fiction -- one could split the proverbial literary hair to no end. It comes down to this: words on a medium (preferably one that can show the words) reveal in some format the soul of said Writer/Artist/Human. In many ways, it is the ultimate self-portrait, control fetish, and ego pleasure. Damaged gives a romp and rough ride of what a sensitive soul of the artist and author can be like. It also shows what it takes to survive.

Déjà Vu is the sensation of having experienced something that you really couldn’t have experienced. Sometimes everyday experiences blend together making you wonder if you’re not repeating the same actions you did earlier. Sometimes you meet people you are sure you met somewhere before. Sometimes there is even the nagging impression that the person was significant in your past somehow. As hard of déjà vu is to grasp, what would happen if you discover a journal from another time when you realize you are not only attracted to the individual, but you actually know him? Definitely a hair-raising experience, one Emily, the protagonist of Gwynn Morgan’s Back to Tomorrow, experiences.