Book Review: The Cottager

An elderly woman travels back in time to save her teenage son’s life. She’s waited decades for this opportunity, but when it comes, she finds herself in a past she doesn’t recognize. Her family appears the same as she remembers. Her son, for now, is alive–but when she installs hidden cameras throughout the family home, she uncovers another layer of his life, a pain she’s never seen.

Did she go back far enough? When did he decide to take his own life? She watches from the empty house next door, observing her past from every angle. Still, the more she looks, the more she wonders what she can’t see–and what happens when the past notices she’s watching?

Book Review: Across the Broken Stars

Leon has a secret. He was once an angel – a winged warrior sworn to protect Paya, a realm where people live on discs that float in space. He failed.Now, Leon’s a broken man, trying to forget the past. He thinks he’s the last angel. But then a young fugitive stumbles onto Leon’s doorstep. She’s an angel, too. And she has a riddle leading to a place where angels still live. Or so the stories claim.

Desperate for redemption, Leon begins a perilous quest through myth and folklore. But will Leon and the fugitive find their legendary destination? Or will Leon lose his last chance for salvation?

Across the Broken Stars by Jed Herne was published February 3, 2020, by Undergrove Press.

Book Review: The Library Cosmic

In this fabulous and moving collection of short stories Ben Berman Ghan traverses time, space and the written word to consider the mysteries of life. From ghosts to golems to far future AIs these stories ask the big questions: What is consciousness? What gives a being its soul? What are the boundaries of love? And, perhaps most importantly, how will libraries save us all?

The Library Cosmic by Ben Berman Ghan was published May 26, 2026. Literary Press Group of Canada provided a galley for review.

This is a collection of six stories of varying lengths (some easily near novella length). "Spectres of Bibliotheca" is seeped with symbolism and lyrical beauty. The same goes with the title tale of the volume "The Library Cosmic". As a librarian, I truly support their messages and themes.

I liked that the stories each stand alone but yet also fit into a larger tapestry. They all exist in the same shared world, with overlapping elements between them.

Book Review: Harvested - Fall of Nature

Kristi Wolf was preparing to become a mother. Then the lights came, and something tore her unborn child from her womb. When Kristi awakens, she’s no longer in her world. She’s trapped in a dying future Earth where the human race survived extinction by becoming something else entirely. The creatures humanity once feared as aliens are not visitors from another world. Aliens are us. From the future.

In this future, natural-born humans are hunted, harvested, and experimented on for the genetic purity buried in their DNA. Society has fractured into engineered bloodlines bred for beauty, violence, obedience, and intellect. As civilization rots beneath its polished surface, Kristi joins two other survivors ripped from the twenty-first century. Together they uncover the horrifying truth behind the abductions, the experiments, and the secret feeding on humanity across time itself.

Book Review: Time Travel for Beginners

On a bustling road in Sydney, Australia, lies a nondescript storefront known simply as the Time Travel Agency. Inside, you’ll be welcomed by the smell of fresh-brewed coffee, a selection of baked goods…and the question, Where in time do you wish to go?

The guidelines are simple: you can go whenever you wish into the past, and there’s no fear of altering the present. Have tea with Jane Austen, scream at a Beatles concert, witness the Olympics in ancient Greece. Perhaps a more personal trip? Visit your long-lost grandmother, recapture the heady days of your youth, return to the idyllic time when your teen was a babbling baby—or watch yourself make the one decision that changed everything.

Book Review: The Disco at the End of the World

In 1977 - a world in which America launched its space program shortly after WWII - Mitch Ward followed Flynn, the lost love of his youth, into the US Spaceguard. Now, he’s stuck on a backwater moon base with his only friend, Gloria, watching every shuttle in the hope Flynn will be on it.

After an inexplicable encounter with a strange, euphoric being, Mitch and Gloria find themselves dishonourably discharged, and stuck in a USA rapidly sliding into fascism with no plans and no future. There’s nothing for it but to move to Los Angeles to chase their dreams, and find their people in the discos of the city.

But when Flynn crashes back into their lives, claiming to be the host for an emissary of a utopian civilization approaching Earth, he offers Mitch the power to protect himself and friends across the queer community, so they never have to live in the shadows or face oppression again. With the world on the brink of cataclysm, and Mitch and his friends being squeezed out of every space, it’s down to this community of disco-loving outcasts to stand up for what is beautiful and right.

Book Review: The Franchise

A land filled with magic and dragons and wizards and warriors. Thousands of people live and work within its borders, fearful of their enemies and loyal to their king.

The classic fantasy world of The Malicarn has been brought to life on the big screen in a series of phenomenally successful blockbuster movies, almost entirely populated by characters in total belief that their sham fantasy lives are real. A fan-favorite actor finds himself doubting the studio's work, but this franchise has an almost unstoppable momentum, and bringing freedom to a population that already believes itself to be free won’t be as easy as he thinks.

Book Review: The Midnight Train

No one can change the past, but the Midnight Train can take you there. The chance to re-live the moments that meant most. To see what kind of person you really were.

For Wilbur his best days were with Maggie, the love of his life. On his honeymoon in Venice. Before he gave it all away.

He wishes he could go back and live differently.

But to do so risks everything...

The Midnight Train by Matt Haig will be published May 26, 2026. Viking Penguin provided an early galley for review.

Book Review: Double Shadow

Rome, 2019. Time-traveling, Smithsonian archaeologist Rabbit Ward is back in the present, but not for long. Helen, his former adversary and growing ally, is in trouble with the law after being framed for a murder she didn’t commit. Stuck in hiding and running out of other options, she turns to Rabbit for help. "Help" in this case involves a trip to first century Jerusalem to track down a mysterious man named Einar Eshek.

But Rabbit won't have to do this mission alone; as soon as he arrives in 68 CE, he meets a younger version of Helen, one who has never met him before. Together, they work to track down Eshek, who turns out to be not only a time-traveling thief, but a murderous psychopath.

Book Review: God's Junk Drawer

Forty years ago, the Gather family—James, his daughter Beau, and his son Billy—vanished during a whitewater rafting trip and were presumed dead. Five years later, Billy reappeared on the far side of the world, telling an impossible tale of a primordial valley populated by dinosaurs, aliens, Neanderthals, and androids. Little Billy became the punchline of so very many jokes, until he finally faded from the public eye.

Now, a group of graduate astronomy students follow their professor, Noah Barnes, up a mountain for what they believe is a simple stargazing trip. But they’re about to travel a lot farther than they planned. Noah (the now grown Billy Gather) has finally figured out how to get back to the valley. Accidentally bringing his students along with him, he’s confident he can get everyone back home, safe and sound. But the valley is a puzzle—one it turns out Noah hasn’t figured out, and they’ll need to solve it together if there’s any chance of making it out alive.

Book Review: Battlestar Galactica

Few television science fiction series have had the enduring appeal of the original, late 1970s Battlestar Galactica. Despite lasting only one season (1978-1979), almost half a century later Battlestar remains a cultural touchstone and major influence on genre productions in a variety of media. For all its popularity, however, Battlestar remains a largely unstudied series, with relatively few resources available for those interested in learning more about the show, including both its development and its afterlife.

This companion is the definitive resource for fans of the series. It contains all the essential facts that fans would expect, such as plot and other details of each episode, but uniquely also explores the scholarly and philosophical influences on the series. Battlestar Galactica borrows extensively from classical mythology and biblical sources, as well as from myths and folklore associated with nation-building and the timeless wonder of travel stories. In many regards, Battlestar is nothing less than an Aeneid in outer space, telling the story of how an exiled, defeated people seeks a return to their ancestral home, surmounting countless perils along the way. Fratantuono brings his expertise in classical mythology and ancient history to bear on the series.

Book Review: Memoirs of a Lyrical Man

In 2014, Jay Hagaki's life as a famous actor and musician is filled with fame and fortune. But when a brush with death sends him back to 2007, the world of celebrity fades, replaced by a seemingly average life—until the danger and intrigue begin. Hunted by shadowy forces, Hagaki is sent on a wild ride, taking him deep into the unknown. Amidst the chaos, he's drawn to a woman who haunts his dreams, her connection to his life a tantalizing mystery.

While the present and the future tango in his brain, memories of a previous life resurface to join the dance. Do these memories hold the key to a cryptic puzzle that threatens to consume him?

Memoirs of a Lyrical Man by Steven Templar was published on November 15, 2023, by Mysterious Ink Publishing.

Book Review: The Memory Collectors

Elizabeth aches for one more precious hour with her son who died in a senseless accident. Andy is desperate to find his first love who vanished after a whirlwind romance. Logan craves the rush of surfing and mountain climbing, yearning to reclaim the freedom he lost after a misstep landed him in a wheelchair. Brooke is looking for an hour of relief from the guilt of an unforgivable mistake.

Enter Aeon Expeditions, the groundbreaking time travel invention of Mark Saunders, which allows some lucky clients the chance to spend an hour in their past. Even though Aeon’s technology ensures time travel can’t alter the future, all four clients, including Mark’s ex-wife Elizabeth, yearn to revisit the hour that changed their lives forever.

Book Review: Splinter Effect

Smithsonian archaeologist Rabbit Ward travels through time on sponsored expeditions to the past to secure precious artifacts moments before they are lost to history. Although exceptional at his job, Rabbit is not without faults. In a spectacular failure twenty years ago, he lost both the menorah of the second temple and his hot-headed mentee, Aaron. So, when new evidence reveals the menorah’s reappearance in 6th century Constantinople, Rabbit seizes the chance for redemption.

But from the moment he arrives in the past, things start to go wrong. Rabbit quickly finds out that his prime competition, an unlicensed and annoyingly appealing “stringer” named Helen, is also in Constantinople hunting the menorah. And that’s only the beginning. The oppressed Jewish population of the city is primed for revolution, Constantinople’s leading gang seems to have it out for Rabbit personally, and someone local is interested enough in the menorah to kill for it.

Book Review: The Third Rule of Time Travel

Scientist Beth Darlow has discovered the unimaginable. She's built a machine that allows human consciousness to travel through time, to any point in the traveler's lifetime, and relive moments of their life. An impossible breakthrough, but it's not perfect: the traveler has no way to interact with the past. They can only observe.

After Beth's husband, Colson, the co-creator of the machine, dies in a tragic car accident, Beth is left to raise Isabella, their only daughter, and continue the work they started. Mired in grief and threatened by her ruthless CEO, Beth pushes herself to the limit to prove the value of her technology.

Then the impossible happens. Simply viewing personal history should not alter the present, but with each new observation she makes, her own timeline begins to warp. As her reality constantly shifts, Beth must solve the puzzles of her past, even if it means forsaking her future.

Book Review: Dissolution

Maggie Webb has lived the last decade caring for elderly husband, Stanley, as memory loss gradually erases all the beautiful moments they created together. It's the loneliest she's ever felt in her life. When a mysterious stranger named Hassan appears at her door, he reveals a shocking truth: Stanley isn't losing his memories. Someone is actively removing them to hide a long-buried secret from coming to light. If Maggie does what she's told, she can reverse it. She can get her husband back.

Led by Hassan and his technological marvels, Maggie breaks into her husband's mind, probing the depths of his memories in an effort to save him. The deeper she dives, the more she unravels a mystery spanning continents and centuries, each layer more complex than the last. But Hassan cannot be trusted. Not just memories are disappearing, but pieces of reality itself. If Maggie cannot find out what Stanley did all those years ago, and what Hassan is after, she risks far more than her husband's life. The very course of human history hangs in the balance.

Book Review: Immortality Bytes

Yay, free money and a life of leisure! Except only if you never have children. Sure, a cute little version of you (but not yet so screwed up) sounds fun. But with AI robots taking more jobs, who can reject that “bargain” hoping to afford kids someday?

Stu Reigns does. He’s an idealistic AI programmer and part-time influencer. His demisexual ex-girlfriend, Roxy Zhang, nears perfecting electronic immortality. Add in billionaire banking rascals, and there’s no more certainty — not even “Death and Taxes.”

An old-money Southerner is buying Roxy’s company. This infuriates a sick, rival oligarch — who is about to be rightfully convicted of epic fraud. To escape to this digital eternal life, he compels Stu to steal it.

You’ll never guess all the twists, but maybe the reader peering over your shoulder will.

Book Review: Dark Space

If life were fair, ace pilot Jose Carriles should have ended up a desk jockey like his former friend Corin Timony, back on the lunar colony of New Destiny. Instead, he’s the pilot of the Mosaic—a massive ship taking the Interstellar Union’s first-ever mission to outside our solar system.

Timony should have been the best spy at the Bazaar, the lunar colony’s international intelligence arm. Instead, she’s been demoted to admin duties like monitoring long-range communications. She has no one to blame but herself—and maybe Carriles.

But when the Mosaic experiences a series of strange malfunctions and Carriles is forced to take a wild gamble to save the ship, he begins to suspect the reasons behind the exploratory mission weren’t exactly on the up and up.

Book Review: In Any Lifetime

Dr. Jonas Cullen has spent his career as a groundbreaking physicist defying the odds. But on the best night of his life—the night his wife, Amanda, tells him they’re finally having a baby—everything is taken away when a tragic car accident claims the lives of Amanda and their unborn child.

Gutted by pain, Jonas sets out to find a way to bring back Amanda—or rather, find a parallel universe in which she’s still alive. But that’s easier said than done. As Jonas comes to understand all too well, the universe favors certain outcomes…and Amanda’s death is one of them.

Book Review: Dungeon Crawler Carl

You know what’s worse than breaking up with your girlfriend? Being stuck with her prize-winning show cat. And you know what’s worse than that? An alien invasion, the destruction of all man-made structures on Earth, and the systematic exploitation of all the survivors for a sadistic intergalactic game show. That’s what.

Join Coast Guard vet Carl and his ex-girlfriend’s cat, Princess Donut, as they try to survive the end of the world—or just get to the next level—in a video game–like, trap-filled fantasy dungeon. A dungeon that’s actually the set of a reality television show with countless viewers across the galaxy. Exploding goblins. Magical potions. Deadly, drug-dealing llamas. This ain’t your ordinary game show.