Janiera Eldridge

This is a great little ebook, filled with practical advice on how to save money without signing on to a program of Virtuous Self-Deprivation. We all want to have fun and enjoy ourselves, even, or perhaps especially, in these tough economic times when just paying for necessities is tougher than ever.

Having Fun While Saving Money is mainly aimed at young people, still in college or raising young families. There are lots of tips for inexpensively throwing parties, organizing outings with your kids or with your friends without blowing the budget. She covers everything from clever, fun craft projects to making good use of resources like Groupon or LivingSocial. Just when I (librarian that I am) was starting to say, "What about that wonderful resource, your public library?" she starts talking about all the great things available at the public library--books of course, but also museum tickets, computer access, music, and DVDs.

The last chapter covers four rewards programs she has tested herself. The one that grabbed me was AMC Theaters' Stubbs program--for $12 a year, you get free upgrades on concession purchases (order a small popcorn, upgrade to medium), and every $100 you spend earns you $5 in rewards money. If you're a regular movie-goer it's a great deal. BUT, when I got to an AMC Theater, it was an even better deal! They are, for a limited time, selling Stubbs memberships for $6! If you like movies, it just can't be beat!.

That's just a small sample of the great information Eldridge offers in this book, and the price of the book can't be beat, either: just $0.99 on Smashwords. Go get it!

Highly recommended.… (mais)

Although Dana is human, as soul sister to vampire Ani she could potentially live forever. Unfortunately, Ani’s decision to kill a human who tries to hurt Dana causes the vampire leader Donovan to decide that the sisters are more trouble than they’re worth. Fortunately, the sisters have some powerful friends and if they manage defeat Donovan, Ani will be safe as the new vampire leader. But first, they have to survive…

This book has a lot of potential. The writing was occasionally stilted, perhaps because the words and sentence structure were reasonably simple, but the writing was certainly not bad and wouldn’t have distracted me from a really good story. At the beginning, I was completely engrossed in learning more about the unique vampire mythology the author created. It’s so fun to see a new take on an old legend, especially one in which vampires enjoy being vampires instead of being all angsty about it. At only 80 pages long, I was dreading running out of book!

Sadly, I ended up feeling very let down by the second half. In the last forty pages, nothing happens except the characters preparing for a massive, climactic showdown with Donovan. There’s training, and more training, and the book slowly started to drag. Eighty pages suddenly seemed like a lot to get through! If this had, in fact, lead to an epic showdown, I would have been ok with all the lead up. Instead, the bad guys basically just surrender and the anticlimactic ending takes only a few pages. I might read more be the author since she had some great ideas, but in this case I was disappointed with the execution.

This review first published on Doing Dewey.… (mais)

What would it be like to roam the earth and not be seen or heard? You could see your loved ones, but they wouldn’t know you were there. Everyone is going on with their lives and all you can do is observe. That may be what ghosts feel like, they are shadows of their former selves and not a part of society anymore. They see everything and have nothing but time on their hands. This is the idea behind Good Ghost Gone Bad by Janiera Eldridge.

Brianna Moreno was a normal 22-year-old woman. She had a family, bills to pay and was trying to start a career. That all changed when she was murdered walking through the park one evening. Brianna’s killer is the only one that can see her and he’s happy to know she will be walking the earth unseen for eternity. She wanders the streets feeling lonely and wanting revenge, but she doesn’t know how to get it.

Just when Brianna thought things couldn’t get worse, she discovers her killer also plans on murdering her sister. Brianna has no clue on how she can save her, until she meets her killer’s other victims. The ghosts get together and learn how to use their powers to make their killer pay. Vengeance comes with a price though and Brianna may not like what she becomes.

Good Ghost Gone Bad hits on some interesting themes such as loneliness, love, vengeance and not taking anything for granted. I love the way this story begins, the author makes you feel Brianna’s loneliness by describing her walking down the streets and the wind blowing through her. Then she recounts her brutal murder and how her hopes and dreams came to an end. I liked hearing Brianna tell all the little things she missed about being alive such as reading and sleeping. There is a lot of depth to all the characters in this story and some good action sequences.

There were some grammatical errors in this book that took a little away from the story. Also there were some things that didn’t make sense, like when the ghosts find a victim being held captive by their killer and don’t seem to care. Than later on a ghost saves a person even though his struggle with the killer had already summoned help. I would have liked to know what happened to the people who came to help.

The positives out weigh the negatives in the story. The killer’s revelations towards the end really made me think and they were a surprise coming from a murderer. I also found the killer’s double life interesting, along with his wife’s attitude towards him. It was also interesting to see how Brianna changed as a person throughout the book and the decisions she makes towards the end.

There is a lot going on in this novella and Janiera Eldridge does a great job of telling a good story and creating memorable characters. This book may have had some flaws but it was a good read and I found myself looking into Janiera’s other works as soon as I finished. Good Ghost Gone Bad is a different kind of ghost story and a good example of how much depth a horror story can have.… (mais)