Victoria Williamson

Charlie Briggs, con man, thief, and occasional murderer when the situation arises, has left London to gain a little respite from those who would harm him, and has arrived in the quiet town of Petersfield. Always on the lookout for something of value he can steal and launder through his underworld contacts, he is drawn to a rare book shop…..”The smell of books came wafting from every corner of the shop. The sweet musk of old volumes lovingly bound in soft leather”....By chance he identifies a first edition of “The Art of War” by Sun Tzu which had belonged to a young man called Arthur Richards, presented to him by his father on his 18th birthday. Arthur was yet another sacrificial lamb in the senseless slaughter of innocents that was WW1. True to his vocation Charlie steals the book, knowing that this is the key to his fortune, and his future, but unfortunately for him this simple act of theft opens his mind to all the horrors, death, and indiscriminate use of mustard gas that was WW1…..”Yet somehow Charlie couldn’t shake the chill that closed around his bones and bit deep. His fear took shape, manifesting as a yellow fog that rolled in from the narrow alleyways and enveloped the gaslights. He’d seen that fog before, and he knew what it meant. He forced his aching feet on faster fighting the urge to look over his shoulder”....

The background of the 1st world war is perfect material to showcase horror.Those who fought everyday, and indeed died, endured and witnessed the most diabolic acts forever imprinted on their minds, never to recover. Charlie Briggs by his selfless act of theft and total lack of respect will soon be drawn into the bloody conflict there to see and experience the short life of Arthur, and live to regret his action, and his greed which will be repaid in full. This is a book that is suitable to both teenagers and adults, as the author brilliantly encompasses an edge of the seat horror story with the terror of young men trapped in mud filled trenches, mown down by machine gun fire, their bodies forever maimed by the barbaric use of chemical warfare. Highly recommended.… (more)

3.5
Book source ~ TWR Blog Tour

Amberley Jain and her best friend Ricardo Lopez are what my generation would refer to as: little stinkers. LOL Twleve years old and getting into things they really shouldn’t be, but with good intentions in their hearts. Along with a bunch of colonists from the Old World, the kids are just trying to survive on a planet turned hostile after a meteor strike releases radiation and turns bugs mutant. Or, as they call them, mutabugs. When something else even worse than the mutabugs rises up from the Cauldron (site of meteor strike) it’s all hands on deck. And that includes the kids though the adults don’t know that. Yet.

I had a hard time connecting with the kids. Not sure why really. I’ve enjoyed all of this author’s works previously, so it may just be me. After the first few chapters though I got it into gear and strapped in for a terrifying ride. Mutabugs. Gross! Bugs don’t usually bother me, but even I would probably have a hard time with ginormous bugs that can regenerate. Wut?! That’s just crazy talk! Anyway, the kids are resourceful and clever and they have help from a few rebelish adults. The plot moves fast and is entertaining so that the grand finale is upon you before you know it. If you like MG Sci-Fi Adventure then be sure to pick this up.… (more)

In a Nutshell: A paranormal historical novella dealing with two kinds of horrors: the horror of war and the ghostly one. Both are equally haunting. A quick and fairly satisfying read.

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Story Synopsis:

Just a few months after the Great War has ended, petty criminal Charlie Briggs is forced to lay low in a small Hampshire town during the holiday season. But he hasn’t stopped looking for the next victim to be cheated or the next object to be purloined.
When he discovers a precious antique book, he steals it and waits for his fence to set up a life-altering transaction that will bring him enough moolah. The book, however, has other plans.
The story comes to us through the limited third-person perspective of Charlie.

At just a hundred pages long, this novella is a quick read that can be easily completed in a single sitting. But don’t assume that it is an easy read, as well. There are many gut-wrenching scenes in the descriptions of the war scenes. It is painful to remember that such events actually occurred, and men did suffer because of such weapons. The paranormal elements are also eerie, but at some corner of our minds, we always think of paranormal content as fiction. Therefore, to me, the war-related horrors were more traumatising. It was quite ironic that the book Charlie was trying to fence was Sun Tzu’s famous ‘The Art of War’.

The titular poppy is the perfect floral choice for this book. Not only do poppies symbolise remembrance and respect for veterans of WWI and later wars, but the flowers also stand for imagination, sleep, and blood in various interpretations, all of which are applicable to this plot. The haunting scent of the flowers is quite visceral in the storyline.

I enjoyed the atmosphere of the book. Though things get a tad bit repetitive in between because of the similarity of Charlie’s nightmares, the writing is still gripping enough to keep the reader going. Some scenes are so vivid that I felt almost claustrophobic while reading them.

The writing creates a nice interplay between actuality and imagination. Even until the end, it is tough to figure out how many of Charlie’s experiences were a result of his distraught mind and how many were genuinely caused by the ghost. This adds a nice layer of complexity to the already intriguing plot. The story being set at Christmas time adds to the impact as everything in Charlie’s life is exactly the opposite of what Christmas stands for.

Charlie is an unusual main character in that he is a person you would love to hate. It is tough to feel sorry for him when the rare book turns his life upside down. This is one of the stories where you would be supporting the ghostly entity rather than its (his?) victim.

That said, I wish there was some more detailing to Charlie and his experiences. One basic fact that is skipped out is Charlie’s age. Age isn’t always material to understanding characters, but it sure helps. In this case, knowing how old Charlie was would have guided me much in evaluating his life choices and his behaviour. Moreover, I never figured out why Charlie was the “chosen one” for the ghost. There were others who owned the book before and they didn’t seem to suffer the same way. The repeated “Remember me” also didn’t clarify matters. Keeping in mind the personality of the human who haunts Charlie in the ghostly avatar, the post-death behaviour didn’t make sense.

The ending is a winner in every way except one. There’s no closure, no explanation of the whats and whys. Things just happen and then they end. That was a big disappointment to me as I like to know the justifications behind a supernatural entity’s actions so that I can sleep better at night.… (more)

War of the Wind was fast-paced and easy to tear through.

Max’s development adjusting to his deafness and his interactions with his family, his friends, and society at large changed because of it. He was a compelling character, being a bit of a bully or at least cruel out of cluelessness before his accident and suddenly being flipped to the other side of the bully-bullied equation. He’s angry about his disability and more so about other people’s responses to it — refusing to use alternative ways to communicate, treating him like the disabled kid and nothing more, refusing to listen when he tells them what he is and isn’t capable of — even though he still holds many of the same ideas that make people act like that. His journey and mixed feelings were the best part of the book.

The thriller aspects were enjoyable too. The mystery didn’t stay a mystery long and the resolution to that plot line was a bit underwhelming, but it was fun and had brought in some legitimate horror elements too.

As it’s described as an eco-thriller, I expected there to be some viewpoint explored about environmentalism or clean energy, but it doesn’t engage with that angle much. It almost seems to be going for conspiracy theory territory with the use of the turbines and the phones to mind control the populace, but swerves away from that by making it kind of inconsequential that those were the methods used. If it wasn’t called an eco-thriller I might not have even thought about it that way. Seems like odd marketing.… (more)