The Confederate War Bonnet

The Confederate War Bonnet: A Novel of the Civil War in Indian Territory
by Jack Shakely
(iUniverse / 0-595-46140-9 / 978-0-595-46140-0 / February 2008 / 272 pages / $17.95)

Reviewed by Dr. Al Past for PODBRAM

The Prologue of Jack Shakely’s The Confederate War Bonnet poses an intriguing question about an elaborate Pawnee war bonnet donated by the Ford Foundation to the University of Oklahoma. Why, in its intricate beadwork, should there be the repeated motif of the Confederate flag? Was it a hoax, or a joke, or a political statement?

Why indeed? That war bonnet, now in the Smithsonian Institution, was not a hoax. It is real, and mentioning it at the outset of the book brilliantly and concisely illuminated to me how I, despite being a reasonably educated person and not unfamiliar with the Civil War, knew nothing at all about the war’s effects on American Indians.

The author, a fourth-generation Oklahoman of Creek descent, is a former journalist whose family owned newspapers in four small Oklahoman towns. His novel is an expertly fictionalized account of the plight, and the fate, of a number of Indian tribes during the unpleasantness between the states. The average person might expect that the Indians would not come to the defense of the Union, which after all had forced most of them off their ancestral lands and relegated them to strange lands, breaking treaty after treaty and dealing with them shabbily at best. And that would be true, for many Indians. But others did indeed cleave to the Union, and this difference often divided individual tribes. Unfortunately, many of those tribes were at odds with other tribes in the first place. The Civil War only served to subdivide them even further.

It was a very complex situation, and beyond the scope of this review to explain. Suffice it to say that the general reader will gain an appreciation of the complexity, sadness, and eventual glimmers of hope that emerged from this national disaster. The student of history will find a good deal more.

All readers will enjoy the highly readable narrative the author has laid over the historical record-the book is worth reading simply as a tale of the American west. Long term, however, it adds to our understanding of who we are as Americans, and what we have done and failed to do as a nation. To that end, readers will appreciate the author’s note at the end: all but a couple of the characters in the story are real. The battles and so forth are described as accurately as can be known.

That war bonnet figures into the story, beginning, middle, and end. I hope I visit the Smithsonian some day and see it, or stumble across a photograph. It will inevitably recall a flood of impressions made by The Confederate War Bonnet. How many books can you say that about?
 
See Also: Dr. Past's B&N Review
Dr. Past's Authors Den Review
Jack's Authors Den PageJack Shakely's Blog
Celia Hayes' BNN Review
Dianne Salerni's Review (scroll down the page)

God Outside the Box

God Outside the Box:
A Story of Breaking Free
by Patricia Panahi
(AuthorHouse / 1-434-36775-4 / 978-1-434-36775-4 / April 2008 / 292 pages / $15.95)

Reviewed by Dianne Salerni for PODBRAM

For many people, a diagnosis of cancer at the age of 28 would be a devastating blow. For Patricia Panahi, who was as shocked and frightened as anyone would be by such news, it turned out to be a crisis point which set her on a path of spiritual development which she continues to follow today.

God Outside the Box: A Story of Breaking Free is Panahi’s narrative describing her spiritual journey towards understanding herself and breaking through negative and self-deprecating beliefs that limited her potential for growth. Born of a Catholic mother and a Moslem father, Panahi spent her younger years "trying on" various religions, including not only Catholicism and Islam, but also Hinduism and Shamanism and a host of others. Each exploration left her feeling confused and unsatisfied. She eventually concluded that most religions confined God in a box and presented him to believers as a "package deal." Not liking any of the packages, Panahi avoided religion altogether, until a close brush with cancer in 1979 caused her to reconsider her purpose and role in life.

What begins as a tentative search for spirituality leads the author into a lifelong quest for "the path to God within." Panahi starts out as a skeptic, who rolls her eyes over such things as "rebirthing sessions" and "Spiritual Mind Treatments," but gradually becomes aware that these inner explorations provide her with relief from spiritual pain. Her quest for a better understanding of her Higher Self leads her to open a metaphysical book store, develop her own quiescent leadership talents, bring an end to a marriage that had ceased to function, relocate herself to a faraway state, find her soulmate, and eventually to write this book.

There were many parts of God Outside the Box that were personally significant and meaningful to me. There were also times when I thought Panahi’s spiritual adventures sounded a little too "out there" for my tastes, but I think the author would sympathize with my perspective, because she, too, began as a skeptic and only by degrees came to change her beliefs. Patricia Panahi clearly states that everyone’s spiritual evolution is different and each person must find her own path to God. The beginning of the book was a little disjointed, with several slips of verb tense and some of Panahi’s important life experiences presented in a non-chronological order, but these small problems disappeared by the end of the second chapter and did not diminish my overall appreciation for her message. God Outside the Box is a book that I will remember for a long time and may turn to the next time I need a little spiritual guidance.

See Also: Dianne's B&N Review
Dianne's High Spirits Review
The Well Woman Cookbook
Patricia Panahi Book Signing

When Pigs Fly

When Pigs Fly by Bob Sanchez
(iUniverse / 0-595-40770-6 / 978-0-595-40770-5 / November 2006 / 307 pages / $18.95)

If you’re looking for a light, quick, entertaining, summer read, When Pigs Fly is an excellent choice. Retired technical writer Bob Sanchez has released his first novel and it’s a slam-bang hoot with the offbeat energy of Raising Arizona raging through its pages. In fact, most of the action takes place in Arizona, and that’s not a bad coincidence at all.

The storyline is both twisted and convoluted, so try to stay with me here. Since I never give away any more of a book’s plotline than I as a consumer would want to read in a review, the following description is merely the beginning. An eighty-year-old couple in Lowell, MA, buys a lottery ticket with the jackpot numbers printed right on it. A stinky, three-hundred-pound, sleazebucket thief steals the ticket, but he does not put it in his pocket. The thief has already been sentenced to a time of less than one year for a previous conviction, and the ticket is good for a year. Instead of cashing it in immediately, he hides the ticket inside an urn in the couple’s house, planning to retrieve it after serving his time. Little does he know that the urn contains the ashes of a dead city policeman. The son of the couple is a retired Lowell cop now living in Arizona. After losing his longtime wife, Mack Durgin had chosen to retire where he and his wife had always planned. He had not planned to receive a FedEx package from his parents containing the urn of ashes, the hot ticket, and some costume jewelry his addled elderly mom had included as a bonus. Mack has a drunken quickie with a lady of less than stellar reputation, and her boyfriend with a tattoo of a brain on his skull doesn’t care for the dalliance. Two brothers in crime once familiar to Officer Durgin back in Lowell join forces with the brain/skull guy and Mr. Piggie to track down the high-flying lottery ticket. In the meantime, Mack has come to his erotic senses and begun courting a nicer young lady, one whose charms have also entranced an Elvis impersonator who doesn’t know when to zip up. Last, but far from the least interesting, is Poindexter, a pet javelina pig that has just won a big ribbon as his owner’s science project. Trust me: you’ll be rootin’ for Poindexter all the way to the end!

A lot of action, humor, poignant dialogue, and, of course, wild and crazy characters have been crammed between the covers of When Pigs Fly. Bob Sanchez has said that he enjoys making people laugh, a concept that becomes obvious from the style of his first novel. There are some of the standard POD boo-boos such as misplaced common words and punctuation errors present in the book, but the number of incidences is considerably less than average. You can tell that Mr. Sanchez cares enough to present a professional product to his readers. Due to line spacing within the dialogue and the presence of many short chapters, When Pigs Fly is a somewhat quicker read than its page count might imply. Especially as the author’s first foray into the humor genre, When Pigs Fly is a highly commendable first effort. You’ll fly through this quirky little story just like Poindexter!

See Also: The B&N Review
The Blogger News Network Review
The Authors Den Review
Bob Sanchez' Website
Review of Bob Sanchez' Getting Lucky

Cyberdrome

Cyberdrome
by Joseph & David Rhea (CreateSpace / 1-434-80995-1 / 978-1-434-80995-7 / January 2008 / 292 pages / $14.95)

Reviewed by Dianne Salerni for PODBRAM

The Cyberdrome Corporation has found a unique way to develop ground-breaking technology: create a supercomputer containing hundreds of simulated human worlds, allow them to divert naturally from the true course of Earth’s history, and watch for the development of revolutionary technologies that don’t exist in the real world. The millions of inhabitants of these worlds have no idea that they are only programs, living simulated lives and observed by scientists from Earth Zero. Of course, the scientists from Earth Zero don’t realize that they are only programs, living in a simulated world and supervised by employees of Cyberdrome who are biologically interfaced with the digital universe.

When a rogue virus gets past the firewalls, wreaking havoc on the program and trapping forty humans interfaced with Cyberdrome, corporation leaders bring in Alek Grey, an expert at preventing break-ins to secure systems. Alek is not only the son of Matthew Grey, the top scientist of Cyberdrome currently trapped in the program, but he is the creator of the Cyberphage, the program which inserted the attack virus after it was stolen from Alek himself.

Cyberdrome is a fast-paced techno science fiction adventure, but do not be put off by the term “techno.” Written by two brothers with a background in designing computer games, Cyberdrome is nevertheless accessible to readers without experience in computer programming or simulations – like me. I prefer my science fiction to be based on unique settings, complex plots, and fascinating characters, and here Cyberdrome does not fail. Certainly, there is a degree of technical language, especially in the first couple of chapters, but I considered this to be “world building” and the Rhea brothers introduced the universe of Cyberdrome by immersion, rather than by tedious explanations. It was not more than I could handle, and I loved the storyline.

When Alek ultimately interfaces with Cyberdrome, he encounters programs that think they are human, humans who might just be programs, and a program that could possibly be turning into a super-human intelligence. Layer after layer of plot twists and double-crosses add to the delicious tumult, and the authors even tip their hats at the reader by acknowledging this. When the heroine warns the hero that the character they have just encountered is “not real,” the character replies, “I’m quite real. At least in the context of our current understanding of what defines reality in this world we have created.” Now that’s a mouthful!

Action packed, with memorable characters and imaginative settings, Cyberdrome is a satisfying science fiction adventure. And, if you do happen to have a background in computer programming or gaming, you’ll probably appreciate it on a whole other level!

See Also: Dianne's Authors Den Review
Dianne's High Spirits Review
The Cyberdrome Website
Joseph Rhea's Website

Second Anniversary

Today is the Second Anniversary of PODBRAM. Of course, we passed the first anniversary as iUBR, so the two-year period covers the history of this same website in all its guises. Surely I have said in some previous post somewhere that when I stop learning new things in the process of working on any project, I soon get bored with it. New experience is the secret of happiness, as far as I am concerned, so you can expect PODBRAM to continually grow and evolve as a book review site.

Here is a very brief history of my own writing experience. You might understand why my books span such a broad base of subject matter, as well as why PODBRAM has always been a work in progress that never really stops evolving. I began putting together my first book in about 1967. I actually do not remember the exact year. It began with handwriting in a spiral notebook, just as many of your earliest works probably did. I began this as a freshman in college majoring in General Liberal Arts. By the time I had graduated with a BA in Psychology, the book was complete and my personal theory of personality development was completely baked. I knew it was not much of a commercial effort, and I also knew that one day I would rewrite the whole thing into a much more professional release. That project became the first thing I did after I retired in 2001.

Although I am quite unmechanically inclined, I have been a car nut since I began identifying the year of a Cadillac by its tailfins in about 1954. I have been reading books about cars and the car culture for decades. At the beginning of 1980, the next new experience I desired was to locate and purchase a 1970 Corvette Stingray and begin writing stories and articles about classic Corvettes and the car culture in general for the local Corvette club newsletter. That newsletter became the most famous of its kind for Corvette clubs, but I had planned my own new experience of the future even before I had completed all my compositions. I knew that I would eventually turn all of The Corvette Chronicles into a book entitled Plastic Ozone Daydream. About eighteen years after setting this plan in motion, I got married (for the first time), sold the car, left the club, and began editing the book. Daydream was released on the last day of December, 2000.

I am almost as fascinated by boats as I am by cars, and at the end of The Nineties, I saw a most unpleasant pattern developing that made me want to capture something special before it was forced out of the marketplace forever. No matter how much American manufacturing had already left the USA, recreational powerboats were still a strongly American industry, but I could see its demise coming from a mile away. Outboard Marine Corporation had been struggling as a company for decades. All the wonderful little mini-jets of the early Nineties were either being discontinued or moved disgustingly up-market in size and price. Many boat brands from decades back were either being consolidated or filing for bankruptcy. The boat industry was clearly one of the last strongholds of American manufacturing to die a slow, painful death. It did not take much effort for me to complete my research and organize it into a book for all the boat lovers of the past and future.

A genre I read a lot, in addition to car books, is that of economic and political nonfiction, so I began planning one of those for my fourth performance. I had planned to write a book named 2010 and release it last year. I had been following the housing bubble long before it popped. Did I mention that most of my career life had been spent in the financial services industry? 2010 was going to be an historical summation of how and why Americans have gotten ourselves into this current economic tsunami. I completed the first chapter and a complete outline of the rest back in about 2005, but before I went much further with the project, my wife convinced me that its approach and tone were too negative. The next step was to switch gears a little and present a tightly edited package of all the good, positive, fun things about America. The view down the steep hill from the exclusively expensive neighborhood on the book's cover is an inside joke. We were at the peak of the housing bubble just before it popped, and I was fully aware of that fact.

My books all have common threads running though them. I write about entertaining megatrends on the surface, but I am also deeply conscious of the undertow these same trends harbor. My goal is to entertain and inform. Accomplishing only one of these goals is not enough. I want to do both.

PODBRAM has lately become my most favored project. I have greatly diminished the time I spend on other projects such as my original e-tabitha website. That's why it seems to have been static for the past year or so. I just don't have the time to do both. For the time being at least, PODBRAM will retain its iUBR URL, so newcomers finding the site through links scattered all over the web will still find PODBRAM. If you put PODBRAM in Google, you will always find us, one way or the other, and that's what really matters. Authors Den will be phased out of the review system at the end of 2008. This is not a negative reflection on AD in any way. It's just that I personally as an author and PODBRAM as a review site have outgrown the advantages AD offers to new authors. I have always said that AD is one of the best ways to move you and your books upward in the Google search rankings, and I still think that is true. The situation now. though, is that you can put my name, POD Book Reviews, or PODBRAM in Google anytime and you will find us all instantly.

The goal is and always has been to expand the horizons of both authors and readers. The PODBRAM of the future will continue to offer new and surprising features and changes. My entire life and all my goals are about quality instead of quantity, and PODBRAM is no exception. I have never been a prolific writer, and I never intend to become one. I am as slow, methodical, and meticulous as a turtle, but as I continually remind my wife, the turtle always wins the race. I want PODBRAM to become known as a review site that is as exclusive as the neighborhood pictured on the cover of Timeline. and like any legitimate review site, reviews will always be free. They may not be exactly what the authors had in mind, but they will be real.

The Shadow Warriors

The Shadow Warriors
by Judith Copek
(Imprint Books / 1-591-09960-9 / 978-1-591-09960-4 / November 2003 / 476 pages / $19.99)

Reviewed by Dr. Al Past for PODBRAM
 
If you are reading this, then you are a computer user, and if you are using a computer, you are probably aware that doing so can expose you and your machine to many dangers: viruses, Trojan horses, worms, bugs, bots, spyware, malware... the list seems endless. Countering them (and creating them) is the province of highly specialized, intelligent, and often, quirky people.

The Shadow Warriors is a book set in this world, spanning several genres: mystery, thriller, techno, and techno-thriller. There's also a generous dose of romance. The narrator and main character is an attractive woman with a history, many male admirers, a lover of good food, fancy restaurants and hotels, and a classy dresser. She's also intelligent, computer-savvy, and inquisitive, traits which put her in the middle of a complex and dangerous situation.

Apparently not inspired by, but certainly reminiscent of, the famous, feared, fizzled Millennium Bug of 2000, the story centers around the efforts of a group of computer hackers (not necessarily a term of opprobrium, it turns out), including the protagonist, Emma Davis. Their task is to retrieve some software that has gotten away from its creators and been turned into—possibly—a fearsome, world-stopping doomsday suite of computer programs. While this goes on, Emma must sort out her personal life with three men, one being her husband. The threat of digital disaster is a timely and entertaining notion, and there is no need to detail the course of the action here. It's enough to say there are murders, chases, narrow escapes, creepy suspects, intimate trysts (PG-13), and building tension enough for anyone looking for an absorbing experience.

While there is some amount of techno-speak it is minimal and will not disturb the reader who does not care to wallow in it. It should also be said that the heroine closely observes the clothing of other characters and describes meals and hotels in considerable detail. It may be that female readers will particularly enjoy this aspect, but in fact this male reader did too—the author's descriptive powers are considerable. Many of the settings are described wonderfully well—those who have traveled widely, or would like to, will especially enjoy this aspect of the book. The author also has a fine ear for dialog.

On the other hand, the cover was not nearly as appealing as it could have been. The text was cleanly written and edited, and the small number of typos and grammar glitches that slipped through did not significantly detract from the experience. The story line was quite complex, what with the heroine's personal life intertwined with a large group of other significant characters, some with similar names. I'm glad I didn't try to read the story at the beach or in an airport lounge: it required concentration to follow. A list of characters at the back of the book would have helped. (There are some promising recipes there, but alas I didn't try them.) It was a long tale, moreover, and while it grew increasingly absorbing as it proceeded, looking back I wonder if whittling it down a bit, concentrating it, might have made it even more compelling.

The Shadow Warriors was a timely and fun book. The general reader would enjoy it, and I for one look forward to more by this talented, promising author.

See Also: Dr. Past's B&N Review
Judy Copek's Website

Palace Council

Palace Council by Stephen L. Carter

(Knopf / 978-0-307-26658-3 / July 2008 / 528 pages / $26.95 retail / $17.16 Amazon)

Special Note: This review of Stephen L. Carter's Palace Council represents the first of several big changes coming soon to PODBRAM. This book is to be officially released tomorrow, but I began reading a pre-release copy late last month, and my reviews have been available at B&N and Blogger News Network since 7/2/08. Of course this is not a POD book, but we are now & More, and this is some of the More. From now on, the POD books selected for review at PODBRAM will bump covers with a few traditional bestsellers. More details will follow in a later post. On with the show!

Although I had heard of Stephen L. Carter long ago, this is the first book of his that I have read. As a Baby Boomer born six years prior to Mr. Carter, I have been living through and following the same historic, modern American events that the author has so explicitly integrated into his complex tale of intrigue. Palace Council displays a clever conceit similar to the one so prevalent throughout the movie, Forrest Gump, in which lead fictional characters intertwine seamlessly with famous figures and events in history. To compound the power of the story, the book is written with the same fascinating depth of family saga that made certain books from an earlier decade such bestsellers. Palace Council, in one way or another, aptly reminded me of Rich Man, Poor Man, Kane & Abel, and All the President’s Men. With its plot encircling the interrelationships among Joe Kennedy, his legendary sons, LBJ, MLK, and the grand poohbah himself, J. Edgar Hoover, this book is certainly a second cousin to a lesser-known miniseries that I have always loved entitled Hoover vs. The Kennedys. The punch line is that Palace Council is as good as any of these famous, wonderfully detailed books and movies.

Stephen L. Carter’s third novel tracks an ambitious young writer and social commentator as he interacts with his friends, family, fans, and many famous names in American politics. The reader might envision Denzel Washington as a very intelligent Forrest Gump who happens to know all the right people during the tumultuous years between 1952 and 1975. The main element of the book that fascinates me is the way the author has so adeptly combined what is almost a non-fictional, historical storyline with an extensive fictional saga of the exploits of key members of several wealthy, influential families. Stephen Carter is clearly a high-level intellectual who is fascinated by The Sixties and all the changes that did or did not have a lasting effect upon the American social and political landscape. Palace Council is every bit as much fun to read as some of the better Harold Robbins novels, and with its covers crammed with real movers and shakers of our lifetimes, the poignancy drips off the pages.

Whether or not you believe in conspiracy theories of one theme or another, I feel that most deeply thinking Americans have at least considered this fact. There have been many cases throughout the country’s esteemed and infamous history in which, if a conspiracy was not afoot, then our great nation has been ruled either by insufferably long strings of consequence or notions of deep stupidity. I have long harbored at least a few thoughts toward the former simply because the alternative is far less fathomable. Palace Council is one of those poignant, yet on the surface fictional, books destined to pose as many questions about our history as it does answers.

Some reviews of Stephen L. Carter’s previous novel, New England White, mentioned the complexity of the plot and characters of that book as a negative issue. Although I sincerely think the readers who will enjoy Palace Council the most are ones who are old enough to remember many of the events, the complexity of the plot or characters never even once left me scratching my head in confusion. Certainly this is not a book composed for morons, or even for those who think the antics of Paris Hilton or Lindsay Lohan are news, but is it too obtuse for the citizenry? Never. Palace Council is one whopper of a sophisticated, highly topical, thought-provoking novel. The plotting and editing are impeccable. The storyline is fascinating. Splitting the difference between political nonfiction published by numerous television talking heads and some of the best fictional, epic sagas, Palace Council impressed the hell out of this author and longtime avid reader. This book will reside on my bookshelf with some of my favorite fiction and nonfiction. However you want to categorize Palace Council, let’s just say that Mr. Carter has written one hell of a fascinating saga of thrilling intrigue.

See Also: The B&N Review

The Blogger News Net Review

Stephen L. Carter's Wikipedia Page

Cla$$ism for Dimwits

Cla$$ism for Dimwits
by Jacqueline S. Homan
(Elf Books / 0-981-56791-6 / 978-0-981-56791-4 / February 2008 / 488 pages / $21.95 / Amazon $17.78)

Jacqueline S. Homan is acutely disturbed by poverty in America, her own as well as everybody else’s. What differentiates her book from most of those that delve deeply into the same subject matter is that she is talking about lower class white poverty. Although Ms. Homan recognizes the obvious issue of race as it pertains to poverty in America, that particular element is clearly not the subject of her obsession. That subject, as implied by the title as it is written, Cla$$ism for Dimwits, is just plain money, cash, moohlah, the stuff with which you pay the bills. Those bills are the most basic you can imagine, from rent to gasoline to electricity to the phone bill. Cla$$ism for Dimwits is about the everyday struggles of the poor in America, how they fell into a financial hole and why they are unable to dig themselves out.

The author states her case beginning with her own personal life history as an orphaned two-year-old raised by her grandmother. She was thrown into the street when her grandmother died eleven years later, but she eventually moved in with her older half-sister. The two sisters retained a minimalist subsistence by utilizing multiple low-wage jobs for a number of years. She moved up the income ladder a bit by entering the construction industry at age 22, but an auto accident less than two years later prematurely destroyed her burgeoning career in the trade. Many years later she would graduate from college with a BA at age 34, in spite of the detrimental effects of mild dyslexia and severe poverty.

Cla$$ism for Dimwits is a difficult book to rate for readers because its supremely significant message is marred by technical foibles and amateurish presentation. Although you could make a case that I am being overly critical, I would say that many potential readers will promptly feel the slap from being called dimwits before they even open the cover. They might also be put off by the 3D WordArt graphic on the cover that is barely readable. Oversized margins and 1.5 line spacing turn what should have been a 200-page book into 480 pages. The author has told me that others advised her to publish the book this way because the text would be easier to read, but as soon as the average reader opens the book, he will see that the author was misled. The book is also full of the usual proofreading errors indigenous to self-published books these days. Far too many of the points made by the author are repeated throughout the text, most using the same or similar phrasing or terminology. Last, but not least, there are numerous missed opportunities in which supporting references to key points of data are not included, either within the text, as footnotes, or in the bibliography.

Ms. Homan is to be congratulated for both her personal climb out of the educational and poverty hole enough to compose and publish this book, and for her guts to face down her accusers in such a blatant manner. Most of what she says in Cla$$ism for Dimwits is most certainly true, whether she is describing labor riots of several decades ago, the rise to power of a Howdy Doody-like President on the backs of unfortunate Americans, or the final destruction of our middle class safety net by the current administration. My opinion in the final analysis is to give Jacqueline Homan an A for effort, but a C in execution. That leaves Cla$$ism for Dimwits with a four-star average. I loudly applaud her choice of subject matter, the personal approach to it, and the energy and resources she fired into the project; however, certain elements lacking professionalism drag the book down to a somewhat lower level.

See Also: The B&N Review
Jacqueline Homan's Blog
The Blogger News Network review
Review of Jacqueline Homan's Eyes of a Monster
Divine Right: The Truth is a Lie

The Last Horizon

The Last Horizon: Feminine Sexuality & The Class System by Floyd M. Orr
(iUniverse / 0-595-24472-6 / 978-0-595-24472-0 / August 2002 / 271 pages / $17.95 / Kindle $4.80)

Reviewed by Dianne K. Salerni for PODBRAM

In The Last Horizon: Feminine Sexuality & The Class System, non-fiction author Floyd M. Orr presents a new perspective on today’s middle class American society. Mr. Orr is not afraid to speak the blunt truth that we all know (but continue to deny): a person’s sexual attractiveness is the single most important factor for social success in America.

Mr. Orr’s theory is based not on empirical testing or psychobabble, but on his observations of American social structure over a lifetime. He has dubbed this structure The Class System-not to be confused with an economic class system based on income. Floyd Orr’s Class System is a pattern of behaviors that determine "a pecking order" in American social interaction. Family background, economic position, and education play their roles, but the most important factor is how physically attractive a person is.

The author proposes that The Class System is the product of a nation that, since the end of World War II, has not had to fear death on a grand scale from war or epidemics. With physical survival practically assured, Americans have been able to develop the most consumer-driven society in history. The important question asked by a typical American family is not "Will we survive this year?" but "What will we buy this year?"

The Last Horizon is written for women and is meant to be a guide for finding a mate who is more interested in his woman than his car or his favorite sports team. However, some female readers may be turned off by the author’s blunt language and obvious dislike for the shallow values of "the herd mentality" within The Class System. Almost by his own definition, the very women who could most benefit from his advice on choosing men are the ones who will be ideologically unprepared to accept it. Because of this-or perhaps because I already have a wonderful husband-I wish Mr. Orr had focused less on the applications for dating and more on his very interesting observations of society and the corporate world which perpetuates the system for its own benefit. Personally, I found these to be the most interesting parts of the book.

Once you read The Last Horizon, you can never un-read it. I have caught myself applying his Class System designations to people I know and the characters on my favorite TV shows. I have suddenly noticed how Disney Channel sitcoms tend to perpetuate the values of this system, and I’ve started asking my children to turn that channel off. In retrospect, I think The Lost Horizon explains my entire adolescence! But beware-before choosing to read this book-can you handle what you will learn?

See Also: The Horizon page at e-tabitha
Dianne's High Spirits review of Horizon
Dianne's B&N Review

Reflections of a Khmer Soul

Reflections of a Khmer Soul
by Navy Phim
(Wheatmark /1-587-36861-7 / 978-1-587-36861-5 / August 2007 / 164 pages / $14.95)

Reviewed by Malcolm R. Campbell for PODBRAM

Navy Phim was born in Cambodia in April 1975 as the insurgent forces of Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge seized control of the country bringing to an end a brutal civil war against the US-backed government of Lon Nol. However, the brutalities did not end with the war’s end: two million Cambodians would die at the hands of the Khmer Rouge during the next 45 months through starvation, execution and torture.

Pol Pot proclaimed 1975 as Year Zero and began his "purification" of the country, ridding it of city dwellers, capitalists, westerners, banks, stores, hospitals, churches and other purportedly unnecessary organizations, while forcing mass numbers of people into agrarian work camps. Those who did not survive the work and the torture, those who were often forced to dig their own shallow graves, ended up in what Cambodian photojournalist Dith Pran called "the killing fields."

Reflections of a Khmer Soul is a collection of stories, "snippets," travels and contemplations representing Navy Phim’s inner and outer journey away from that Year Zero. Her outer journey began when her parents left Cambodia for Thailand for economic reasons in 1979. Swept up in a mass exodus of some 600,000 people, Phim’s life for the next four years was largely defined by refugee camps and the roads between them. 

At six years of age, Phim helped the family earn a living in the camps by selling bread at a marketplace stall and nearby neighborhoods. "When I returned to Cambodia and saw young merchants touting their produces," Phim writes, "I remembered my life as a peddler in the refugee camps and how much I hated walking around with my merchandise, being afraid of meeting Thai soldiers."

Finally, after a year in the Philippines in a refugee status, her family was sponsored to the United States, ultimately settling within the large Cambodian population of Long Beach, California. 

This beautiful, well-written book also explores Phim’s inner journey, one concerned to a large degree with identity. She asks questions and tries to understand how and why Khmer could kill Khmer. Phim lives within the very long shadow of the Killing Fields and the near-requisite negative connotations for the word "Khmer." While that shadow is real and persistent, Phim did not see, much less know about, the Killing Fields as a child in the late 1970s.
"To think of myself as a survivor of the Killing Fields is strange," writes Phim. "I did not live through the Killing Fields per se, but I am trying to understand the pain, loss, dehumanization and post-traumatic syndrome that lingered in the minds of many survivors."

Some people assume that because she was born in Cambodia, Phim is Khmer Rouge or that her parents were Khmer Rouge. It’s as though an entire people have become tainted in some way or held to be complicit in the actions of Pol Pot’s political party. Phim’s inner journey brings her to the realization that while she does not carry shame for being born when and where she was, "being Cambodian requires a lot of explanation."

Phim’s journey took her back to Srok Khmer, the country of Khmer, the motherland, four times. She writes that the "kind of love, heartache, and pain I feel for Srok Khmer is deeply imbedded within my soul; these feelings are suffused with glorious memories and stories that are real, even if they are stories and distant memories that may not even be mine."

Reflections of a Khmer Soul is a rich tapestry of memories, dreams and reflections of the tragic yet wondrous Srok Khmer into which Phim was born on Year Zero and the America where she grew up and makes her home. Phim’s soul is "poetically Khmer," and this book shows us that she has found joy and hope and peace in that ultimate reality of her world.

See Also: Malcolm's B&N Review
Malcolm Campbell's March of Books
Navy Phim's Website
Malcolm's Round Table

The Twelve Dreams of Laima

The Twelve Dreams of Laima

by Lee Cross

(Virginia City Publishing: Cauldron of Dreams Books / 0-978-75961-3 / 978-0-978-75961-2 / September 2000 / 244 pages / $13.95)

Reviewed by Celia Hayes for PODBRAM

The Twelve Dreams of Laima is a dreamy, mystical odyssey through history, told though the lives of twelve different people. All but one are incarnations, previous lives of the same man, Art Zemaitis, a professor of history with an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. His quest for insights into history leads him from America, back to his native Lithuania, on a folklore research project to interview that handful of rural elderly who retain some knowledge of the old ways. He finds the old woman named Laima, living in an ancient old-growth forest in a tiny wattle and daub hut. Who is Laima and what is she to Art? That she is someone of significance and possesses mysterious powers is plain – but what is she to him, personally?

As it turns out, she has the ability to grant him his deepest wish. “More than anything, I crave to know what it was like in times gone by.” He tells her – and to his astonishment she calmly replies that she has the ability to help him do this, to embark on a voyage of discovery, of all his past lives.

Each chapter tells of one of those lives, hop-scotching across time and the new and old worlds, through lives that are sometimes happy, long and successful as their world counts such things, and sometimes short and ending suddenly in fire, violence and war. In several lives Art lived as a woman: a priestess of Cybele in ancient times, as a medieval woman accused of witchcraft and burned at the stake, and in his most significant but shortest incarnation, a little girl in modern America. More usually he is a man and frequently a warrior of some sort: a prince of the Goths, a sailor on the USS Arizona in 1941, an Australian bush-ranger, a warrior chief of the Scythians, a refugee Druid from Roman-era Britain, a Confederate blockage runner, a soldier in the American Revolution, or a Special Forces soldier in Vietnam. Each of these chapter-episodes is a tiny, condensed novel unto itself, reduced to its essence of experience in a world quite violently different from each of the others – and yet each would make a satisfactory novel itself if expanded to full length. But that is not the authors’ purpose, and Laima’s purpose does not come clear, until the last of Art’s lives is lived and ends – and that is a twist that the reader may not see coming.

Mr. Cross’s prose is lyrical and precise, suitable to each character in his or her time and place. Any criticism I may make is limited to noting that the transition as Art moves between his past lives and his present one are sometimes awkwardly devised, as the narration jumping abruptly between first person and third. This is especially noted in the first couple of pages – perhaps the first person narration was meant to be in italics?

See Also: Celia's B&N Review

Celia's Blogger News Review

The Author's Website
Review of Lee Cross's Pandemonium in 2012
Review of Lee Cross's A Far Place in Time

Legend of the Dark Messiah

Legend of the Dark Messiah:
The Mask and the Sword
by J. Johnson Higgins

(iUniverse / 0-595-47215-X / 978-0-595-47215-4 / December 2007 / 204 pages / $14.95) 

Reviewed by Ron Baxley for PODBRAM
 

Comic masks, in the modern theater, are often symbolic of comedy itself and go back to ancient Greek drama. Wearing a projected comic mask, President Dmitri von Calvin in J. Johnson Higgins’ suspenseful Legend of the Dark Messiah in actuality creates tragedy on his home planet of I-Star, a fantastical planet that blends magic and technology. One would find a match for President Calvin if suddenly Big Brother and Rowling’s Minister of Magic and Lord Voldemort had merged under an illusory version of the Guy Fawkes mask from V is for Vendetta. It seems at first that the villains do always get the best development and concepts in fantasies but Higgins soon proves even this old saw rusty. After all, Cassidy, the intriguing main character of his book, can magically see through his mask and becomes involved in what could be a tragedy of her own. Keeping potential tragedy under a mask of his own is part of Higgins’ skill.

The suspense of what could be a tragedy is the highlight of this book as Cassidy is shown in a prologue battling an evil force and surrounded by dragons. The dragons are part of the suspense as one begins to wonder what her connection is to them. Perhaps more clues could have been given, but this would have hindered the author’s mastery of suspense. Cassidy is soon encased in a kind of magic cryogenic chamber of ice and, upon escape, finds herself on the modern world of I-Star.

I-Star is a technological, highly political world with some magic users, but Higgins, among his politicians, who are a blend of the Jedi-like and the Empire, does not get bogged down into too many political discussions like one of George Lucas’ Star Wars prequels. With too much politics and not enough suspense, readers will not be engaged with speculative worlds. However, Higgins engages the reader, leaving him wondering what the connection is between Cassidy and the aforementioned president.

Eventually, after Cassidy discusses with a spy how something should be done about the area’s big landmark, a gigantic clock tower, she is sought out by President Calvin to bring a clock tower to its former glory. Little does Cassidy know that President Calvin is a dark figure from her past. Irony abounds as the reader grows aware of this while Cassidy is skillfully kept unaware by the author.

Hindering the suspense is some of the dialogue, which focuses on mundane aspects of life. True, modern people have many mundane tasks that they engage in, but the author need not create verisimilitude in a fantasy book by having the characters harp on about the minutia of life.

The author creates more excitement with the dialogue and plot surrounding Cassidy’s magic powers. Soon, Cassidy discovers that she has them, powers that also connect her to her past. She, much like popular culture characters like Phoenix and the little girl from Firestarter, realizes that she has trouble controlling her powers and often times they are based in anger. She also begins to realize her connection to President Calvin and seeks him out with some friends with adventurous gusto. Some of her realization occurs through a little too much exposition from minor characters and the antagonist.

Though the author could have kept more of the potential tragedy more skillfully hidden under the mask, Higgins does a good job keeping most of it incognito. Probably the weakest element in Legend of the Dark Messiah is that the author could have displayed somewhat more of the storyline’s depth through a show, don’t tell methodology instead of a narrated back-story from other characters. Details could have been expanded to increase the narrative. Higgins also has great potential for future books because many of his characters have a secret connection that will have to be experienced to be believed. What Higgins ends up with in this slim volume is a comedy in the oldest sense of the word, an adventurous romp with a happy ending. This first novel displays a commendable level of taut editing and clean proofreading, too. The excitement and suspense of the basic plotline will keep the reader turning the pages. J. Johnson Higgins has composed a promising first effort.

See Also: Ron's B&N Review
J. Johnson Higgins' website

More Link Madness

I want to continue what I started with Writer's Blogroll last month. Whereas the first blogroll listed mostly bloggers and reviewers, this second installment mostly concerns the marketing of POD books. Some of these are paid (sometimes even costly) operations, but many are free or nearly free. Let the advertising begin!

The Shared Self Publishing Experience - This is quite an unusual new concept premiered by successful screenwriter Steve Barancik. An author is encouraged to post his personal story of exactly how he entered the foray of self-publishing. No direct book promotion is allowed on the site. Steve has an interesting background and there is a legitimacy here that is rare among POD marketing sites.
Foner Books - Morris Rosenthal's site is a legend in the POD industry. The page I have linked here is the one everybody and his bobcat wants to read, the explanation of Amazon's sales rankings, but this is far from the only valuable page on Mr. Rosenthal's site.
Authors and Experts - I spent a year listed with this costly site that did absolutely nothing for me, but your results may differ. Consider this a negative recommendation if you want. I have no animosity toward the site. It could be simply that no one wants to read my books.
Page One Lit - This is an early pioneer in the take the money from the naive POD author sweepstakes. I have been listed here for years, but I doubt that much has resulted from it. The biggest negative with this site is that it takes all damn day to load! Otherwise, in the founder's positive column is that he at least does what he says he will do, your page stays online forever, and you get to rub virtual elbows with real authors!
National Pen Company - For promotional materials, especially pens, of course, I highly recommend this company that has been around for many years. I have utilized their services several times with no complaints. Once you get on their mailing list, they will periodically send you especially good deals by snail mail. Like iUniverse, don't order until they send you a pitch you particularly like!
PR Web - Although I personally have had a difference of opinion with these guys, and I shall probably never use them again, you should know that they are probably the most successful of the many web press release services out there.
Free Press Release - I have linked to my own Timeline of America free press release on this site so you can see exactly how your press release might look. Although not up to the standard of PR Web, this one is, indeed, free.
Google - In the Beyond Obvious Department, we have the submission of an author's website to Google. If you haven't done this, do it right now, before returning to PODBRAM.
Yahoo - Ditto the Google submission.
Real Book Reviews - This is an unusual site that I have discovered that features only audio reviews. I am not sure what it's appeal may be, but check it out. Maybe it's a gimmick you have been seeking.

Echo Five

Echo Five by David Chacko
(Foremost Press / 0-978-97047-0 / 978-0-978-97047-5 / January 2008 / 280 pages / $14.97) 

Reviewed by Dr. Al Past for PODBRAM

When it comes to a book I'm going to review, I generally avoid reading other reviews and promotional material. I would rather approach the book fresh, and let it make its own impressions. Thus it was that some number of pages into Echo Five I was surprised to find I was reading a different type of book than I had expected from the early signs. What I had thought would be a contemporary war-against-terrorists military thriller turned out instead to be a murder mystery, and a rather good one at that.

Jason Ender, a senior-level interrogator of prisoners of the Guantanamo type, is sent to a godforsaken base in the horn of Africa to help determine which, if any, of several prisoners might be a key enemy leader. When he arrives he finds that the main interrogator he was to work with, an attractive lieutenant, has committed suicide only hours earlier, and for no obvious reason. Suspicions aroused, he finds loads of suspects, leads, and possible evidence indicating her death might not have been an accident. The story becomes Ender's efforts to find the cause of the lieutenant's death and those responsible (and why). There is no need to provide details here and plenty reason not to: the story is a murder mystery and generally observes the expected form, including a twist or two at the end.

At the same time, the mystery is indeed set within the exquisitely named GWOT (the global war on terror), complete with multiple levels of bureaucracy, military personnel and civilians with different agendas, and endlessly complex and perplexing tactical and strategic milieus. For fans of such stuff the book would be satisfying for these reasons alone. To this lay reader, the author convincingly depicts all these variables, down to the mind-set and speech characteristics of the people involved.

The text is cleanly written with almost no typos or grammar glitches, but I must insert a personal gripe about the style. The characters' motivations, actions, and words are well thought out, but in fact they all speak in pretty much the same overwrought manner. Even the uneducated lowlifes make statements that they then glibly elaborate in the manner of Oscar Wilde, had he only been in the U.S. military. Furthermore, these quips are all too often completely opaque, requiring me, for one, to have to go back and read them again, sometimes more than once. Some may call this high style; I call it poor editing.

Take, for example, the blurb on the back of the book:

Ender had seen their influence in operation. Control behind the wire ran to civilians, but Intelligence in Kuwait or Headquarters NIC could look over an interrogator’s shoulder as he questioned a detainee and do everything but bring him down with a hard right. They usually did not intervene unless it was an urgent matter and their input could make a difference. But they were there for that and other intervention, too.

Ender had become aware of a third level – a parallel level – that should not have functioned. It was occupied by Shrubsole, and overhead like Nan. He had been to this camp twice when zero would have been the understandable number. Although answering to the government, the Donner Party – and other companies that supplied expertise – could paper any position while they worked the angles with soft words and handshakes. Usually benign, the process could turn rogue. It had.
Blurbs are hard to write, but this one, which was mostly lifted verbatim from passages in the book, makes almost no sense at all. There was too much of this throughout the book for my taste. Those who find the blurb no problem should enjoy Echo Five with no qualification.

See Also: Dr. Past's B&N Review
David Chacko's website
Chacko & Kulcsar's Gone Over
Review of David Chacko's Devil's Feathers
Chacko & Kulcsar's The Brimstone Papers

Mugging for the Camera

Mugging for the Camera: An Album of Odd Poetry Snapshots by R. J. Clarken (Virtual Bookworm / 1-602-64160-9 / 978-1-602-64160-0 / April 2008 / 148 pages / $12.95)

Reviewed by Dianne K. Salerni for PODBRAM

Mugging for the Camera is a collection of light verse and wit by poet, photographer, and graphic artist R. J. Clarken. Described as “An Album of Odd Poetry Snapshots,” this slim novel will surprise and delight you with its quirky, upbeat perspective on life, love, language, and totally bizarre news stories. Many of Ms. Clarken’s poems have been previously published in The Daily Haiku, Sol Magazine, Asinine Poetry, and Trellis Magazine, and this collection brings them together for the first time. Mugging for the Camera is divided into twelve sections devoted to such topics as urban (and suburban) life, weird news, famous dead people, literary parodies, and word play.

Apparently, Ms. Clarken never met a word she couldn’t write a poem about, and readers should prepare to have their vocabulary expanded—or at least poked and prodded. Can you say sialoquent without spitting? Do you know which recent politician caused a scandal with an episode of esquivalience? Can you find even one rhyme for Ytterbium, let alone describe its rare earth metal properties in iambic pentameter?

But Ms. Clarken does not spend all her energy bending the English language. The world news proves to be a source of inspiration for her sublime and ridiculous “snapshots.” In Holland, thrill-seekers pay top euro for live entombment at “Fun Burials,” and in Spain, an energetic couple’s lovemaking sends them through the ceiling (of the hotel room below them). In both cases, this quirky poet-journalist wittily captures the moment for us. Literature takes a hit, too, as she reduces Hamlet, Jane Eyre, and The Wizard of Oz to haiku length. Makes you wonder why Baum, Bronte, and Shakespeare had to be so wordy! (If it even was Shakespeare—and Ms. Clarken doesn’t neglect to summarize that little controversy as well!) My personal favorite, however, is a work-related doggerel entitled Cover Your Ass inspired by a quote from comedian Mike Binder (“Never moon a werewolf”). If you don’t have a werewolf as your boss, you surely have one in the family or the neighborhood and can appreciate the wisdom of, as Ms. Clarken puts it, “keeping your buttocks dressed.”

Overall, Mugging for the Camera is a delightful little book that highlights the silly and ridiculous in our lives. Highly recommended for lovers of word play and haiku and readers who just want a good chuckle.

See Also: Dianne Salerni's B&N Review
R. J. Clarken's Assinine Poetry page
Another review of Mugging for the Camera by Dianne

"H"

"H" by Barbara Dinerman
(iUniverse / 0-595-40930-X / 978-0-595-40930-3 / August 2007 / 126 pages / $10.95)

An experienced writer of numerous magazine articles about various interior decorating issues has released her first novel, and yes, it is about herpes. More accurately, it is a morality play surrounding the office politics of a Fort Lauderdale advertising agency in The Eighties at a time when real estate in South Florida was booming and herpes was a new dirty word. The story follows thirty-something Joan Halprin as she deals with an obnoxious boss at a new job after a European dalliance has left her with a bug in her drawers.

Let's cut directly to the source of the itch, shall we? There is actually very little serious content about herpes in "H", although the book is featured on a website for herpes sufferers. The bug does play a key role in the storyline, but this book is strictly light satire, and is not a self-help reference in any way. If "H" is autobiographical, the author makes no firm implication in that direction, either. Although it would seem that "H" belongs on the same shelf with Tim Phelan's Romance, Riches, and Restrooms, this is true only in the reference of both to embarrassing personal subject matter. Ms. Dinerman's first novel shares more in common with Linda Gould's Secretarial Wars and J. J. Lair's Dream Dancing. It is highly likely that if you enjoyed the three mentioned books previously reviewed here at PODBRAM, you will like "H" for many of the same reasons. All are slice-of-life stories with professional production and adult themes.

Behind the appropriately Eighties-seductive cover lies a book with only one glaring shortcoming: it's just plain too short. The storyline, editing, proofreading, and compositional style are all of a high caliber. The weakness is that the plotline virtually begs for more gut-wrenching, soul-searching, scruple-challenging detail. Although the reader can easily visualize the Technicolor characterizations, there is precious little depth of detail in the storyline. Barbara Dinerman is an established professional writer and this fact is aptly conveyed in the presentation of the package. "H" is easily a four-star effort, but to receive five stars from the head curmudgeon, this morality play should be three times as long with equivalent levels of depth and ambivalence.
See Also: The B&N Review
The Author's Website
The Herpes Website

Our Newest Reviewer

Dianne K. Salerni is an elementary school teacher with a Masters in Education and eighteen years experience in the classroom. She is a native of Delaware who has spent her professional life in the Philadelphia metro area. She traditionally published three short books in the educational field with McDonald Publishing Company in 1997 and 1998, and her first novel, High Spirits, has been receiving accolades from many respected sources. Most recently, her seminal ideas on an Amazon discussion board for historical fiction novelists spawned the creation of the Independent Authors Guild. Along with several others, she has been instrumental in developing the growth of IAG through her blog and their Yahoo Group. She has been publishing book reviews, featuring mostly IAG authors, on her website, and now we welcome her to our PODBRAM family of book reviewers. Although Dianne will soon be reviewing the first poetry book to be featured on this site, her specialty is historical fiction.

Nothing Worth Much

Few things of real value are easily obtained, and this applies to book reviews, too. From observing how much hoopla has been generated recently over the context of what have been called bad book reviews, the time has come for a little discussion of the subject. A lot has changed over the past decade since POD publishing was born, and we all know that the single most significant fact is that any Cocker Spaniel with a typewriter can now publish a book, and that fact alone has changed everything!

The standards for what used to be called a published book have been lowered into the depths of self-absorbed mediocrity. Now everybody and his dog are published authors. What kind of self-centered kids are helicopter moms raising? What are kids learning in school these days, other than layer upon layer of political correctness? Manners good; PC bad. Why is the USA falling off the deep end of mediocrity these days? We never talk about the true source of problems or how to correct them.

There are thousands of inexperienced new authors out there with brains full of PC and hot air. They have not published a POD book to compete in the big leagues with traditionally published authors. They just want to be a cog in the wheel of the new Internet publishing vanguard. They want to get rich and famous. They want to show the world what geniuses they are because they had the funds to pay a POD publisher. They want to market their books so everyone else will see how successful they are. They want to read glowing reviews and see high sales numbers at Amazon. Of course we all want the same thing. The difference is that some of us want it because we worked hard enough to deserve it, but others just want it regardless of how it was obtained.

Probably the single most negative effect of the Internet has been the way it has opened the door for endless slap-fighting, generally bad manners, and an effusive mediocrity. Few arenas have exposed these weaknesses in our behavior more obviously than the advent of POD. Whole mini-industries have popped up to feed the monster, and most disgustingly to me at least, are the paid review sites. These truly represent the Payday Loan Department of the POD industry! Just like the payday loan companies, these prey on the stupid, desperate, and misinformed. They offer a short-term fix for the egotistical fame junkies among us. Do you really think they give a rat's ass about the customers who purchase your books? We all know that any new Wally-World in town shuts out local businesses in the area. For only $75, you, too, can lower the value of all book reviews, as well as that of your book, down into the pit of nothingness.

Of course there are bad reviewers out there. They are just more of the same tacky little turds that like to see their opinions reach beyond the second grade playground. It is unfortunate that Amazon, Blogspot, and Wordpress offer these jackasses a forum, but would you rather live in a police state? Nobody wants their ten-year-old watching porn, but without Playboy, I doubt that I would ever have become so fascinated by in-depth interviews or serious political topics. Shall we throw out the baby with the bathwater, the Playboy Interview with Debbie Does Dallas, or the legitimate book reviewers with the grade-school bloggers and paid sleazebuckets?

The book reviews on this site are intended to be read by both authors and readers. What most of the horde of shallow POD authors actually desire are not reviews, but superfluous blurbs of congratulation. Any author who is truly serious about his craft wants to attract readers who read his book solely because of the quality of his craftsmanship, not because the buyer was suckered by the advertising. Do not kid yourself: paid reviews are a form of advertising, not critique.

You may have noticed that we are no longer officially iUBR. Now we are PODBRAM! Whoopee! The URL remains the same for now so others can still find us. We still offer only legitimate book reviews for both authors and readers. There may sometimes be a tricky, narrow path to walk in order to try to positively affect both sides, but we at PODBRAM work diligently to avoid joining the ranks of the slap-fighter generation raised by helicopter moms. Accurate, unbiased reviewing is a tough business, but we at the all-free, all-the-time PODBRAM are not driven by monetary gains. We are driven by unadulterated dedication to our craft.