Squeal Pig (Pain Training) by Kim Hardwick.

Marcus plays with Theresa in this Adult short story. It is a tale of BDSM between consenting adults and is a coffee time read.

My coffee did NOT go cold on this POOR short story. This whole sorry tale was told from Marcus’s point of view. The dialogue was limited and the emotions very underplayed. This was NOT an exciting read and was like a commentary of a quick boxing match. The action was rather WEAK and FAILED as a fantasy. I did not get a thrill from reading this short story which I did not find sexy. There is a skill to writing good erotic short stories and I did not find it here. This was a disappointing read that I will vote only 2 stars and I suggest you give it a MISS and spend your time on something with more class.

Squeal Pig is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook and was written in 2015.

An Idiot Abroad: The Travel Diaries of Karl Pilkington by Karl Pilkington, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant.

An Idiot Abroad is a tie-in with a popular television programme of the same name. I have NOT seen this TV show, so I read this book with open eyes. But my eyes became tired and I found the writing style to be newspaper column-like, bright but lacking depth. Karl is very much the bloke-in-the-pub who offers his narrow-minded opinions to anyone who will listen.

Karl’s commentary on the Seven Wonders of the World and the countries they are in, is amusing in the same way as drunks can be funny in a party. He offers an alternative view of tourism and history but this comes across as a bored holiday-maker making a claim against the tour operator in the hope of getting some compensation.

An Idiot Abroad is NOT top class comedy but is very similar to a travel blog from a disappointed tourist. It is NOT good writing and is padded out with transcripts of telephone conversations between the three authors. To create a feeling of dumbing-down to the script, Karl deliberately keeps using bad grammar, misusing me instead of my, as in “I had to get me coat out”. I found this very annoying.

Because the writing was lacking, it was supported by the inclusion of some very good photographs so that the reader could get a better understanding of the atmosphere. Although this book is amusing, I found it to be a POOR read. The commentary is more of a moan and lacks punch. I really noticed the difference when I finished this book and moved onto the next in my collection, thinking BANG! this is more like it.

I was disappointed by An Idiot Abroad and it offered very little reading pleasure. I will NOT be bothering with another of Karl Pilkington’s books and this one only gets 2 stars from me. Karl offers his view of the Seven Wonders of the World, so I will offer below the seven most amusing quotes I can pull from this disappointing read, so that you will NOT have to bother reading the whole book.

1: He took me to a mosque. Praying and religion are a big deal in Egypt. Ahmed prays five time a day. I would never keep to it if I lived here. I struggle having my five fruits a day.

2: We went to a block party today. It was the worst party I have ever been to. Aimlessly walking about as people blew whistles and made noise with air horns. I would normally avoid things like this. I remember not enjoying the Queen’s Jubilee street party when I was a kid. Scruffy Sandra ate loads of trifle me mam had made and didn’t bring anything to the party. This block party was worse. There was no trifle whatsoever. People just stood around looking a bit bewildered. It was like wandering amongst the staff of an office block who are stood on the street ‘cos a fire alarm has gone off.

3: I did some yoga with a baba. He laughed because I couldn’t stretch as well as he could. It was hardly surprising really as he was stark bollock naked apart from a pair of shades, while I was wearing combat pants with pockets stuffed full of toffees I’d taken from the first-class lounge at the airport. The guide said if I gave him some more money he would show me more. I don’t know what more there was to see from this fella. The way he was bending upside down in my face I could have checked his prostate gland.

4: Before I left, they took me to the gift shop. I was the only one in there, which was no great surprise given that all the products were made from cow poo and piss. Hardly Bodyshop, is it? In this day and age, when every product has to list all its contents on the label, a shop like this is never going to be big business. They packaged them up well, but as the saying goes, ‘You can’t polish a turd’. And believe me, this place has tried.

5: I had about four hours sleep then was woken by police sirens. They have a selection of sirens to choose from. One goes waaa … waaa, then there’s woo woo and wooooooooooo and daaa daaa. The copper seemed to decide to go through the choice of sirens at four in the morning outside my room. He was like one of them people on the Tube in London who decides to use their commute to see what other ringtones they’ve got on their mobile.

6: I caught sight of a few local newspapers today. They all had gruesome pictures on the cover. There was a big photo of a car accident with dead bodies and a picture of an old man who had shot himself in the head. Back home a headline like ‘Shocking images inside’ normally end up being just of Charlotte Church on a beach with a spot on her arse.

7: Richard asked me if I was excited about getting close to Machu Picchu. I said I wasn’t. How could I be? I was still ill, hot and exhausted. The views were amazing, we were on top of the world, but why people would live up here just doesn’t make sense. My mam and dad have retired to Snowdon in Wales but they’re sick of it being a 15-minute drive to the local Spar supermarket. Living high up just isn’t practical.

An Idiot Abroad is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook and was written in 2010.

The Suicide Flowers by Pete Conrad.

What a way to start a book?...

The vomit seemingly took Gabriel by surprise as he laid his left cheek on the left side of the toilet seat. Half of the retch landed in the toilet, while the remainder skimmed over the right side of the toilet seat and slapped onto the floor. Gabriel was in the final stages of Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia.

...So, not a bright start to a book. I read books for pleasure and get a lot of enjoyment from reading novels. The Suicide Flowers has many rave reviews on Goodreads, so I thought I would buy a copy and give it a go.

This novel has two central characters, Gabriel - with his terminal illness and Raeburn - the lead singer of the rock band Aluminum Jesus. Chapters alternate between Gabriel and Raeburn as this novel crawls to it’s death.

What started off as a challenging read for me, turned into a bore. You knew that Gabriel’s days were numbered and I developed no empathy for Raeburn. The story rambled on and on in a way a fan would rant about music from an artist you can’t stand the sound of. I got no pleasure from reading this book and there were no surprises as this story bled to it’s death. The plot progression was very predictable and the issues of coping with a terminal illness were NOT fully exploited.

The Suicide Flowers was a big let down for me, it did not enlighten or entertain me. It had all the hallmarks of a made-for-tv movie, one that you would switch off at the first advert break. But because I bought a copy of this sorry book, I read it to the deadly end. I did not feel any grief or loss at the end but relief that I could move on to a better book in my growing collection. I will NOT be reading ANY of the three other books that Pete Conrad has written and will vote this boring novel that I could not relate to the minimum score of 1 star. This is a book to AVOID in my opinion and if I wanted to hear a fan ramble on and on, then every Tuesday when our granddaughter Leah comes around, I only have to ask her about Justin Bieber and let her enthusiasm wash all over me.

The Suicide Flowers is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook and was written in 2014.

Deviant by Callie Hart.

Sloane is looking for her sister Alexis and along the way encounters Zeth. Deviant is a hot romantic tale.

I was highly impressed with this novel. The writing quality is very high and the tension gives the reader a rush. I liked the way different chapters gave the view from Sloane or Zeth. Character development was wonderful and it was great that Sloane was introduced as…

No, when I say I’m a ghost, I’m referring to the fact that people rarely see me. I’m the girl in the background. The average height, average weight, average hair colour, non-event that eyes skip over instead of lingering on.

… So Sloane is a plain, ordinary girl next door rather than some irritating highly attractive bimbo that the reader would have difficulty relating to. What is easy to relate to is the passion and the tension of the situations Sloane is thrown into. There is some sex in this romantic novel and it is told with style in an adult way yet is still raw...

She watches me closely as I trail the sharpened steel over her body. Her breasts, her nipples, down her sides, over her thighs. She shaking so hard I have to be careful not to cut her.

...The story develops at a good pace and there is plenty of discreet humour, for example...

I snort as I imagine Zeth trying to pass himself off as my brother. “How did she know he was lying?” Mikey dithers, turning back down the corridor. He wants to get out of here bad. “Mostly because he was black and you aren’t.”

… I got a lot of pleasure from reading Deviant. It is not a trashy novel but a thought provoking adult read that has great depth and emotion. It has great maturity which shows great insight, for example...

I don’t know what I’ve agreed to, but I feel relieved. I’ve seen terminal patients go through this before. They fight and fight for so long, refusing valiantly to give up, and then, when they’re told it’s just no use and there’s nothing more to be done other than to let go… that’s when they find their peace. That is the sea of surrender I am floating in right now.

… So, there you have it, a book that really floated my boat. It was an intelligent read that created such strong images in my mind. Once imagined, you can’t forget as you move onto your next book. Deviant for me was a 5 star read that ticked all the boxes.

Deviant is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook and was written in 2014.

The Vanished by Tim Kizer.

David Miller parks his car, his 5 year old daughter Annie gets out and David plays with his mobile telephone. He looks up and Annie has vanished. The mystery begins as Annie has simply vanished and David does not know where to look.

I enjoyed reading this book and the plot is very different from other missing child novels. I liked the way many very promising lines of enquiry resulted in dead ends. All the pointers were there that suspect X was the right person with the right background and motive. This is a plot driven novel because character development is poor.

Tim’s writing style is different, it is like a television script with lots of short paragraphs. His writing is not deep and would win no literary awards. This book is all about the plot, there is no special use of language, no deep character development, no heavy discussion of leading issues or long descriptive sections. But what comes across strongly is the frantic search for Annie and the belief that the next clue will surely lead to finding her.

The Vanished is a good mystery that is told in a bare bones style. The focus is on finding Annie and nothing else. It ties in well with real life news stories of missing children, when the public guess on social media what has happened. It is not in the top league of mysteries but is still a GOOD read that entertains the reader, so it gets 4 stars from me.

The Vanished is available as an Amazon Kindle eBook and was written in 2015.