I have had many different people on my radio show and our network has changed its name to Books and Entertainment network. So if you're looking for my shows they will be under Books and Entertainment Tales from the Pages. Now I can shorten it to BE Tales from the Pages. How cool those are my initials too. I swear we didn't choose it for that reason, though.
I am working steadily on my third novel, "The Mill Valley High Five". Also, ta, da, I finally sent my second novel, the sequel to If I Could Be Like Jennifer Taylor, called: Who Is Jennifer Taylor? to my publisher. She has still not done anything about it but at least it is there. I am excited about this last book in the series, because it is written in third person. This is the first time I am writing in this POV so it's a challenge. I did it because I felt that some of the characters in the second novel needed a chance to be heard. Actually, some of them asked me to please give them more of a story. You know that authors are always having their characters talk to them. Mine did all summer and that is why when that happened I started the third book. I am now on Chapter 27 so it should be finished soon. As you might know if you have been reading this blog for awhile, I don't outline and never know what my ending will be. It is still a mystery even now. My characters will figure it out I'm sure. LOL
So as the new year begins I thought I would start with a review of a very unusual and interesting book by Brenda Mohammed, a woman who has twenty-four books published and has won many awards, including: Readers Favorite International Book Awards 2018 for her book, I Am Cancer Free. Zeeka Chronicles: Revenge of Zeeka won a gold award from Readers Favorite in Magazine Readers Choice Awards 2018, placed in the top ten for the Author Academy Global Awards 2018 and won an award in the category of young adult thriller in readers Favorite International Book Awards 2018. So it was with great delight that I began to read this book. Here is my review and afterward I will put the interview I had with Brenda here for you to hear.
Review for Zeeka Chronicles: Revenge of Zeeka Books 1-5 by Brenda Mohammed
The story begins with a dream that a renowned doctor has and then finds out what he has dreamed is about to come true. Imagine you are thirty years in the future on a small island that is very developed and was once a haven for tourists. However, due to a freak outbreak of the Zika virus and the rise of zombies created by a rogue doctor, the tourists have abandoned this idyllic island. Now the nightmare that Dr. Raynor Sharpe had experienced is about to come true. A man with a false head has arrived and claims that he is Number Nine, a zombie created by Master Zeeka. He tells the doctor he knows of others who have false heads and mechanical bodies who are being trained by this Master Zeeka to kill. But attempts to find out more are thwarted by the disappearance of this strange man. All that is left is the false head and the recording made of his admission. Although this is a small thing it sets off a whole series of episodes where there is a search for this mysterious Number Nine. As the search continues we are introduced to a series of characters that could have come out of the movies of the 40’s and 50’s including several police detectives and one called Hammer. Hammer could have been played by any of the stars who were hard on the outside and good at strong arming the bad guys with warm hearts. In fact, the entire book feels like a rerun of a good mystery story with its cinematic scenes. The bad guy creates a big disturbance during a public event and the whole thing escalates. There are scenes everywhere including the forest where the police detectives go to try to find the missing zombies and the evil Dr. Zeeka. Dr. Zeeka was believed to be dead but he is very alive as he manipulates his zombies to cause trouble and kill innocent people. In the middle of all this is the love story of Raynor and Janet and how it is related to the story unfolding around them. During the entire time reading this book the reader keeps wondering what will come next. There is almost never a time when the reader feels that things are settled in the first book. By the second book when the reader feels everything has calmed down things escalate again and the whole story continues at a breakneck pace until the end of Book 5. During the reading of this story there are many scientific advances in it. Since the story starts out in 2034 and continues to 2036 there are things in there that are probably in the beginning stages now. However, it is clear that the author has done extensive research on certain of these advances. As someone who likes a little romance with my science fiction I really enjoyed the relationships here. I would recommend it to anyone who likes science fiction. Let’s hope that some of the things she has in here will come to fruition.
Here is the radio show on which Brenda and Shiju H. Pallithazheth were guests:
Until the next time I hope everyone had a good New Year's Eve and you are starting the new year well. Please comment here and tell me about what some of your plans are for the new year.
I forgot to mention that I am on Twitter as @barbehr. I have joined a wonderful group called #WritingCommunity. If you are a writer on Twitter this is a great place to be. It is very supportive and will get you more quality followers who are writers.
My next radio show: BE Tales from the Pages, will be on Thursday, January 23, 2020 at 4pm Eastern time with Cynthia Sharp, Michael Amidei and Susan Strecker. This should be an amazing show! Cynthia is a poet laureate, Michael is an incredible musician and poet and Susan is a multi-published author with a new book.
Don't forget to leave a comment here. Or you can comment under the Facebook link or send me a word on Twitter.
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