Sanity Test by K.E. Adamus and Fate's Last Melody by Vanessa Smith

 

Sanity Test by K.E. Adamus 

This review is a summary. The main review is on LitPick.

Sanity Test is a short but very disturbing look at two very troubled, conflicted, and potentially delusional men

This is a series of emails between Hubert Kawka and Wlodzimierz Pawski. Their emails reveal a great deal about their characters and perspectives through the emails. 

It appears that Kawka is a mentally ill patient in a psychiatric hospital and Pawski is his primary carer, but as the emails continue they become more frantic and questionable. The reader starts to wonder who is sane and who isn’t and who exactly these characters are in relation to each other.

Kawka straddles between childlike impulsivity and frightening sociopathic behavior. Through his emails, he describes a series of dramatic means to get Pawski's attention. He harbors an unhealthy fixation to an unhealthy obsessive degree and is gaslighting the other man. 

However, Pawski’s emails also raise concern. He is more emotional and threatening from the initial emails. This is definitely a potential sign that things are not what they seem and adds to the overall uncertainty that we can’t trust either of these men.

As Pawski becomes more unstable, Kawka becomes more reasonable which leaves the reader with questions about who is real, who is fictional, who is sane, who is insane, and who we can trust. The book gives us no real answers and leaves the reader to make their own conclusions to understand this strange and disturbing duo, 

Fate's Last Melody by Vanessa Smith 

This review is a summary. The main review is on LitPick.

Fate's Last Melody has a strong sense of setting and tone by depicting Hell with all of its overall darkness, graphic violence, scares, and ominous energy coming out from every corner. There is a sense of abandonment, hopelessness, and desolation that exists primarily throughout the book. 

Melody is a woman who is abducted during a night on the town with some friends and a potential boyfriend. Her abductor is not a human psychopath. He is a demon named Nyx who takes her to Hell, where she learns that she is the daughter of one of the Fates from Greek Mythology. Melody has to find her way through Hell and learn how to use her inherited powers of seeing and changing other's Destinies before she meets The King of Hell who has his own agenda involving Melody. 

Melody’s first view of Hell is a dark desolate place shrouded in shadows. The descriptions aggravate the senses and the landscape shapes itself to torture those suffering. Needless to say, it's not a pleasant experience.

Smith makes her version of Hell a composite of different mythologies most notably Abrahamic religions and Hellenic Mythology. Hell is led by The King of Hell who is so vaguely described that he could be either Lucifer or Hades, so it could go either way. The Judeo-Christian influence is shown primarily through the 7 Deadly Sins while the Greco-Roman aspects are revealed mostly through the presence of the Fates and the Titans.

There is an overall feeling of helplessness and abandonment until the end when Melody and other characters are inspired to fight against The King of Hell. But there are some potential questions about the actions that were taken to do this which suggests that Hell might end up with another dictator, one who will also torture others for eternity, inflict pain, and control others.

New Book Alert: The Email From God by Neil Stevenson; Talk To Text Style Highlights Immediacy in This Science Fiction Message From The Future

New Book Alert: The Email From God by Neil Stevenson; Talk To Text Style Highlights Immediacy in This Science Fiction Message From The Future

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: If all of Earth gets an email from God then we will know that we all screwed up big time.

That's the premise behind The Email From God by Neil Stevenson, a Science Fiction novel in which a small group of people from the future send an important email from God to the past to create a better world and beat the secret society determined to stop it.

Brother and sister, Fahim and Amina Graham both work at CERN in 2046 and have a very ambitious plan. In 2023, the entire world, I mean everybody in the entire world, received an email from God telling Earth that humanity messed up and caused mass environmental destruction, endless wars, socioeconomic collapse, hate crimes, and terrorist acts. However, there is time to turn it around before it's too late. So God sends a list of 23 Commandments to follow. The Commandments include ways of saving the environment, improving the economy, obtaining good mental and physical health, and ending violence and prejudice.

Oh and if anyone has trouble with that, then they get hit with a massive headache. Not fatal but just enough to let everyone know that the deity means business. 

That's all well and good. Everything begins to improve.  To make sure of this positive outcome, Fahim, Amina, and their respective husbands Mattheo and Dorje create Hindsight which contains uploads of the email, news articles about the email and subsequent events tied to it, and instructions on how to implement these plans. Then they will send these uploads on a nanochip through a wormhole into the past for Readers of God's email to create this new and better future.

Unfortunately, not everyone is excited about this prospect. The Illuminati is still around (because we can't have a good Science Fiction conspiracy novel without a certain infamous organization). They have a plan to destroy the email, kill God's message, in effect kill God, and create a dystopian society in which they will emerge as rulers.

What is particularly brilliant about this novel is its writing style. There have been other works written mostly or almost entirely in email or text form, e by Matt Beaumont, The Boy Next Door by Meg Cabot, Love Virtually by Daniel Glattaur, ttyl by Lauren Myracle, When You Read This by Mary Adkins among others. This is not a new format but in this context, it particularly works.

The Talk to Text Style throughout this book exacerbates the characters' sense of urgency and immediacy. They have an important message to share and need to get it sent. They are aware that they are constantly being observed and monitored by Illuminati members (some of whom they work for) and have to make sure that their uploads and God's email are properly uploaded. We don't have time for setting description, interior monologues, and other literary tropes. These protagonists are in a rush.

There are some suspenseful moments throughout the book in which the style really helps. For example, in one chapter two characters text each other and then a third enters the chat. It becomes clear that this person is not friendly and at odds with their plans. The two protagonists instantly switch to typical office chat and small talk.

A few other chapters feature the main characters listening in on the Illuminati's plans and becoming sickened by them. It's a heart thumping moment which reveals what could be lost in their current and former lives if they should fail.

The different fonts and writing styles are jarring at first but allow us to realize who is who, even giving us insights into their characters. Amina's font is very soft and curvy, like someone who weighs out her words and considers what to write. She writes long elegant phrases and summaries letting the world know what she, Fahim, and the others are doing so they can be heard and understood. She only stops once in a while to drop a casual informal reprimand to her brother revealing their close, loving, and teasing nature. She is the one chosen to write about and deliver the message.

In contrast, Fahim's font is short, dark, and concise. It is filled with grammatical errors and lower case nouns like someone in a hurry who doesn't have the time or interest to correct his writing. He is also prone to swearing and speaking out of turn showing his pride, quickness to anger, and impatience. However, he also writes in scientific terms and theories revealing his genius in the fields of science and physics. He is the one chosen to create the Hindsight program and the nanochip.

Rather than be a pessimistic book about the future, The Email From God shows a chance of hope. We don't have to turn Earth into a dystopia out of Orwell, Huxley, Bradbury, and Atwood. We have options and choices. Instead of creating the worst, we can make a clear plan to make the world better. 

Weekly Reader: Home Front Girls by Suzanne Hayes and Loretta Nyhan; Moving and Sweet Novel About Long Distance Friendship Between WWII Wives

 

Weekly Reader: Home Front Girls by Suzanne Hayes and Loretta Nyhan; Moving and Sweet Novel About Long Distance Friendship Between WWII Wives

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews 

Spoilers: 

Wartime can make the strangest alliances and friendships. People who would never befriend or even associate with each other from different backgrounds, places, and statuses become allies, simply because they are fighting an enemy army or are at home while friends or family members are doing the fighting.

That is the situation found in Suzanne Hayes and Loretta Nyhan's Home Front Girls, a moving and sweet novel about two American women of different ages, classes, backgrounds, and parts of the country who become pen pals while their husbands fight in WWII.

Glory Whitehall, a young mother from Rockport, Massachusetts whose husband, Robert, is fighting overseas receives one of several addresses, presented by her church, to write to other military wives. Glory selects one with the lovely name of "Garden Witch." 

The "Garden Witch" is in reality Rita Vicenzo, a professor's wife from Iowa City, Iowa whose husband, Sal, is also fighting.

On the surface, the women would have nothing in common. Glory is in her 20's, has one young child and is expecting another, and is from a wealthy family. Rita is in her 40's with an adult son and is from an immigrant family.  Over two years of love, humor, tears, marriage, enlistment, anxiety, rekindling of romance, tested fidelities, and tremendous agonizing loss, the two unlikely women become best friends united by their grief and worry.

As the Readers peer into Glory and Rita's correspondence, they learn how similar and yet how different their lives really are. Both of them are worried about their husbands fighting and both feel isolated within their communities because of that anxiety even though they are surrounded by intrusive but well meaning gossipy neighbors, trying to be helpful but not always helpful female friends, and family members, especially children, with problems of their own.

As with many of the women whose husbands were fighting in WWII, the deuteragonists try to maintain brave supportive faces as they work, create victory gardens, use their ration coupons, attend military support rallies and fundraisers, and raise their children. However, by writing to each other, another woman who has been in the same situation as them, they can convey their worst fears and anxieties. They can let their guards down and reveal their vulnerabilities that they keep hidden from the people around them.

The book also explores their different issues and how they deal with them and help each other. Glory is younger and more impetuous. With Robert gone and two small children, she clings to her childhood friend, Levi. Levi has been a close friend to Glory and Robert and since he has a bad heart, he can't serve in the war. He helps Glory and becomes a surrogate father to her children. It isn't too long before Levi starts expressing feelings that he wouldn't normally express if Robert weren't around. Glory gives into her loneliness and deepest emotions and reciprocates her feelings towards Levi, despite Rita's objections. Glory finds in Levi someone to share her heart aching loneliness, the need to be with someone, that she has felt since Robert's been away. 

Rita also has problems of her own, particularly concerning her adult son, Tobias. Tobias has been romantically involved with a bar owner's daughter, Roylene. Things become more complicated when Roylene becomes pregnant and Tobias enlists before they are married. Despite her own reservations about the situation, Rita provides emotional and physical support to Roylene, becoming a mother figure to her and defending her status as an unwed young mother. Rita relates to Roylene's status as an outsider. She knows what it's like to be judged by a small town so she provides Roylene, the support that she needs.

Rita and Glory's lives change as they encounter death and injury from war. That's when their strengths are truly tested and they depend on not only their own resourcefulness and independence, but the love of the people around them and each other to get through the ultimate hardship of the war.

What makes this book's writing style is the way in which it was constructed. According to the Reader's Guide, Home Front Girls was written via emails between Hayes and Nyhan with each woman taking each character. Hayes, being younger, took the more free spirited and flirtatious Glory while Nyhan, being older took the view of the sardonic and opinionated Rita. In fact, like their characters, Hayes and Nyhan never physically encountered each other during the work of the book. They met after the book's publication and have since met other times (as their leads eventually do as well solidifying their friendship).  Knowing that the book was written similar to how the characters lived, physically separate but emotionally close adds a sense of unmistakable duality between creators and their creations.

Home Front Girls is a novel that explores the deep friendship that women share as they support each other through stress and happiness, whether getting through war or writing a book.