Night Machines by Kia Heavey

Title: Night Machines

Author: Kia Heavey

Classification: Fiction

Genre: Fantasy (Paranormal)/Suspense

ISBN: 978-0-615-48709-0

Year Published: 2009

Pages: 304

Edition: First

Publisher: Kia Heavey

Reviewer: Joyce Shafer ~ http://Self-PublishedAuthorsBookReviews.weebly.com

Author’s website: http://kiaheavey.com/

In this novel of suspense, romance-gone-awry, and the paranormal, the main character, Maggie Moore, is married to Rowan, a detective in the small town where they live, and is the mother of two. Now that her children are a bit older, she’s ready to return to the working world but is anxious about her interview for a part-time job as a corporate communications writer and editor at NarcoDynamics. Dr. Cambien Cuthbert, founder of the company and creator of the clinical sleep aid Anadreme, which eliminates “intense dreaming, night panics, and nightmares,” is a former high school chum, whom Maggie only barely remembers. He’s no longer the lanky, awkward, pale teen but now a tall, svelte, wickedly handsome man of confidence and success—who has a long-held attraction for Maggie. The way she represents herself in the interview with Cuthbert, she’s certain she blew her chance for the job. She’s wrong, of course. Soon, Maggie’s thoughts about her boss seduce her into behaviors and visions that are a form of escape from her predictable life, a husband who is becoming more and more remote, and her insecurities. As is printed on the book cover, “Maggie decided to have an affair. No one needed to know, not even her lover.”

Soon after the story opens, a tragedy happens in their area: A child has been murdered, and there’s no trail leading to her killer. People in the small town where Maggie and Rowan live are in a heightened state of awareness and panic, causing additional problems, which keeps Rowan and his fellow police officers busy nearly around the clock as they address these new issues and simultaneously work the homicide. Maggie and Rowan drift apart, which makes Cambien Cuthbert’s attentions all the more appealing: “She wanted two men and could have neither.” Feeling abandoned by her now careworn, ill-tempered husband, Maggie engages in a very different kind of affair with her boss, an imaginary one that begins to consume her. All the while, Cuthbert inveigles himself into her life in such a way that there seems to be no escape from him or her desire for him.

I found this an engaging read! Murders, manipulations, and agendas…. I have to be careful about spoilers because this plot unfolds in layers that go deeper and darker until… So what I will say is that the author, Kia Heavey, creates a rich tapestry of scenery, motive, character development, and plot. The tension builds deliciously throughout the book, revealing more and more of what’s really going on, which you, more than likely, may not or probably won’t anticipate. She has the gift for turning a phrase and does so effectively and often throughout the book. A big Thumbs-Up for this author’s creative imagination and storytelling skills.

Self-Published Authors Book Reviews

Peckerwood Twist

Nathan Lichtwar

Genre: Suspense/Fantasy

ISBN: 978-0-6152-0231-0

Reviewer: Joyce Shafer

http://Self-PublishedAuthorsBookReviews.weebly.com

Ready to get out of the sweltering summer heat, Sam Paris goes to his usual spot: The Peckerwood Bar in Port Salerno, Florida, famous for its spicy hot sauce and its unsavory characters. The bar patrons are as rough and tough as Sam and his language when someone annoys him. In his sixties and with a history, including as a Vietnam vet, Sam pays attention to everything and everyone around him from “Habit born out of self-preservation and lessons learned the hard way.” He’s minding his own business when a man and his attractive female partner enter the bar and are immediately seen for what they are: more than a little out of place and unconcerned about it, when they should be. The man says he’s a journalist looking for a good story—Sam’s story—and will pay. Sam agrees, and the twisted roller-coaster-like tale begins about his time in the Amazon Jungle with a beautiful, sensual woman he can neither figure out nor resist; Nazi’s in hiding; the hunt for lost cities and gold; and a number of criminal elements who all have agendas they either want to involve Sam in or believe he is involved in—and for a very particular reason. After he tells his story, Sam realizes his past has come back to haunt him—or kill him, and Sam must use every resource he has to try to survive, once again.

Peckerwood Twist is a part-suspense, part-fantasy fiction novel that, as Lichtwar says, is either 90% true and 10% false or the other way around, and based in part on his own experiences. Sam’s stint as a Marine during the Vietnam War was followed by drug addiction, leaving him homeless until he’s picked up in New York City and groomed for a specific purpose by Ursula Jung, a woman who tells lies about what’s going on as easily as she breathes. After hooking up with Ursula, Sam never knows from one minute to the next who he’s going to be running from, who he’s being set up by or who’ll shoot at him next, or who he may have to kill to survive. Whether it’s the result of the cacao used for altitude sickness while in Peru, or real experiences that occur, Sam finds that reality and visions overlap in ways that make him question everyone’s sanity, including his own. Sometimes, his instincts are the only thing Sam knows he is sure of.

Lichtwar created this first novel to be action-based, and takes readers into New York City, Peru, deep into the Amazon Jungle, and onto Florida, where life and the people interested in Sam Paris just won’t leave him in peace to drink himself into a stupor to wash down “the dust of old memories.” The cast of characters demonstrates what happens when people who have agendas will use others and go to any lengths to attain their goals. All in all, this book is a bit of good fun and adventure and an entertaining first book from this author.