Blog Review of Timeless Tulips, Dark Diamonds-
Check out what author and reader, Bianca Gubalke, has to say about my recent release.
book reviews
The Healer
by Donna Freitas
This is a book that fits the category of visionary fiction. Teenager Marlena Oliveira came into the world as a healer. Unfortunately, her mother uses her for her own gains and by the time Marlena is eighteen, she has led a life of prayer and healing but knows nothing of the world. She increasingly questions her gifts and the direction of her life until she seeks out a scientist who can help her explore her talents. She meets a boy, rebels against the imposed prison lifestyle her mother requires, and strikes out to find her own truth.
The scenes of Marlena performing her healings are well done and as believable as mystical states can be described. The teenage longing for maturity and independence ring true. This is a well-written book. The part that didn’t go down so well was the all or nothing kind of approach, the author insisted on. Either Marlena had to choose to remain a healer in the image her mother had chosen for her or leave the healing world for the mundane. Why? I wonder why Marlena couldn’t have found her own way of remaining a hands-on healer. Why the rush for conventionality? Perhaps this choice would require an adult audience? Too risky for YA? I wonder.
My book links:
TIMELESS TULIPS, DARK DIAMONDS
INTO THE LAND OF SNOWS
ELEPHANTS NEVER FORGOTTEN
The Inconceivable Life of Quinn by Marianna Baer
This may not be the best written YA book ever, but it did have a compelling plot idea. Could sixteen-year-old Quinn Cutler have become pregnant while remaining a virgin? While Quinn and her family struggle to come to grips with this most perplexing of mysteries (because Quinn insists she never had sex), her father is campaigning for Congress putting them under scrutiny. Quinn’s pregnancy becomes public, religious fanatics come calling, and Quinn goes into hiding. Can she find the truth in the lies she’s been told and discover the origin of her child? Is she carrying the next messiah? How does her family’s history play a role in everything that’s happened?
Read this book for the odd twists and turns it takes. Remember how hard it is to get anything unique published and that’s why I think this is a bold book- for the author and the publisher. So many things are derivative and everybody these days seems compelled to write a trilogy. Hooray for something different!
ELLIS NELSON BOOKS 