[BOOK REVIEW] One Way Ticket to Earth by Daniele Vaccaro (@DanieleAuthor)

 

Title:  One Way Ticket to Earth

Author:  Daniele Vaccaro

Genre: Science Fiction / Family / Drama

Year Published: 2023

Number of Pages: 25 pages

Date Read: 1/29/2024

Publisher: Daniele Vaccaro

Source:   eARC (Author)

Content Rating:  Ages 13+ (Discussions of Suicide)

Buy on:  Amazon 

I would like to thank author Daniele Vaccaro for providing me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

So, I had received a copy of a short story from author Daniele Vaccaro and this book was called “One Way Ticket to Earth” and man, it was such an emotional and fantastic read!

The story starts off with a young boy named Max who ends up dying and his death ends up badly affecting his parents. But suddenly, Max ends up being reincarnated as an alien being named Sveern and he ends up on a faraway planet called Anturn.  During his time on the planet Anturn, Max longs to return back to Earth and go back to his parents, but the alien beings on the planet Anturn forbid him to return to Earth.

Can Max find his way back to Earth?

Find out in this emotional story!

Wow!  I was quite amazed by how unique and emotional this story was! Daniele Vaccaro does such a fantastic job at writing this story, as this story is full of emotional moments and some surprising twists!  I never would have thought that I would read a story that started off with parents grieving their child’s death and then, the second half of the story focuses on said child being reincarnated as an alien being who lives on another planet.  This is such an interesting and unique premise to the usual story line about the death of a child and how the parents struggled with their child’s death, except that in this case, said child is reincarnated as someone else.  I especially loved all the emotional moments throughout this story, especially the moments where Max’s parents are saddened by their child’s death as those moments hit me so hard since I lost a lot of loved ones over the years.  Also, seeing how Max is homesick for Earth and his struggles with being on a different planet are also emotional moments that can strike a chord with anyone who has to move away from their homes to a new place and are struggling with getting used to their new location, while missing their old homes.

Overall, “One Way Ticket to Earth” is a truly fantastic short story about dealing with the loss of a loved one and also trying to get used to a new home.  I would highly recommend this short story to anyone who wants to read a book about dealing with the loss of a loved one.

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• The Deal of a Lifetime by Fredrik Backman

[BOOK REVIEW] The Big Jump and Other Stories by Benjamin Elkin

Title:  The Big Jump and Other Stories

Author:  Benjamin Elkin

Artist: Katherine Evans

Genre:  Children's / Fantasy

Year Published: 1958

Year Read:  1993 (Re Read: 2019)

Publisher:  Beginner Books

Source:  Purchased

Content Rating:  Ages 4+  (Some Intense Scenes)

Buy or Add on:  Amazon  //  Goodreads

Now, I have been reading many children’s books ever since I was little and most of these children’s books that I had read at the time were inspired by Dr. Seuss’ works.  One of the Dr. Seuss inspired books that I had read as a child was an unknown children’s book called “The Big Jump and Other Stories” by Benjamin Elkin, along with artwork by Katherine Evans and it was such a treat to read again!

The book contains three stories that details the adventures of the King and a young boy named Ben.

The Big Jump

Many years ago, only the king was allowed to have a dog as a pet and the King had over a dozen dogs as pets.  One day, the King took his dogs out for a walk when suddenly, one of the dogs ran over to a young boy named Ben and would not go back to the king.  The king then decided that he will give the dog to Ben if Ben is able to jump to the top of the palace like the King can.

Something New

The story starts off with the King trying to find something new in the woods so that he could take this new item to the bad king of a separate kingdom.  If the good king does not bring the bad king an item that he has never seen before, then the bad king will take all of the good king’s gold.  Ben then comes up with a plan that might help the good king keep his gold.

The Wish Sack

One day, an old man meets up with Ben and decided to give Ben a small wish sack that will grant anyone’s wishes.  Ben was happy with receiving such a gift, but he did not notice that the bad king had witnessed all of this and the bad king decided to steal the sack from Ben. So, the bad king sent his soldiers to Ben’s house and had them steal Ben’s wish sack. Ben tried to go after the soldiers to get his sack back, but the good king came by and told Ben to wait until nightfall so that they could properly enact a plan to get the wish sack back.

Wow! I never would have thought that I would find another children’s book from Beginner Books that would be just as good as Dr. Seuss’ works!  Benjamin Elkin has done an excellent job at writing this book as while it is not done in a rhyming style that is synonymous with Dr. Seuss’ works, the narrative is still creatively done!  I loved the fact that the narrative is both fluffy and intense at the same time as you have light hearted scenes with the King and Ben spending time with each other, while having darker scenes with the bad king causing problems for Ben and the good King.  I loved Ben himself as he is such a clever and friendly little boy who is willing to help out the King with his problems.  Ben’s relationship with the King is probably the main highlight of this book as the good King has complete trust in Ben’s judgement on certain affairs and Ben would do anything to help the King with his problems.  Katherine Evans’ artwork is adorable to look at as all the characters are drawn in an old-fashioned way that is reminiscent of stories like “The Little House” and “Mike Mulligan,” giving you a sort of nostalgic feel to the whole story.

Overall, “The Big Jump” is a truly fantastic book for children who love reading about kings and learning about the importance of friendship.  I would recommend this book to children ages four and up since there is nothing inappropriate in this book, unless the scenes with the bad king might be a bit intense for some smaller children.

You might also like:

• Horton Hatches the Egg by Dr. Seuss

• The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss

• Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are? by Dr. Seuss

[BOOK REVIEW] Nature of the Beast by Hannah Howell, Adrienne Basso and Eve Silver

Title:  Nature of the Beast

Authors:  Hannah Howell, Adrienne Basso and Eve Silver

Genre: Highlander and Paranormal Romance

Year Published: 2008

Number of Pages: 300 pages

Date Read: 3/18/2011

Series: MacNachton Vampires #5

Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp

Source:  Library

Content Rating:  Ages 18+ (Sex Scenes)

Buy or Add on:  Amazon  //  Goodreads



Dark Hero by Hannah Howell – 4 stars 

Berawald MacNachton is apart of the mysterious and powerful MacNachton clan and seems to possess mysterious powers. But, when a beautiful woman named Evanna Massey comes to his cave along with her younger brother David, Berawald starts to realize that Evanna is no normal Outsider and he starts developing feelings for her!

I really enjoyed this story as the characters were great and the romance between Evanna and Berawald was hot and sizzling, just the way I like it! Hannah Howell has done a great job at creating truly memorable characters and an intense plot that had me sitting on the edge of my seat! My favorite characters in this story were Berawald MacNachton and Evanna Massey as they are both kindhearted characters as they are willing to help anyone in danger and I also loved the romance between them as they accepted each others' pains and differences and tried to help each other through every dangerous situation. I truly loved Berawald as he was described as being muscular and handsome (I love that) and I also loved how brave and strong he is as I loved the scene where he fights a group of men who tortured David and I also loved the way that he is willing to protect Evanna and her brother David at all costs from the people who tried to kill her.

The reason why I took off a point for this story is because of the story's pace as it was a bit too slow for me and I often found myself trying to rush through this story to get to the exciting scenes. Overall, “Dark Hero” is truly a great short story worth checking out!

Bride of the Beast by Adrienne Basso – 4 stars 

When Bethan's stepfather, Agnarr de Bellemare wanted to have a group of innocent men killed, Bethan took it upon herself to save these men by freeing them in the middle of the night and she meets a young boy named Haydn who wants to repay her. Ten years later, Bethan is a woman and Haydn is now known as Haydn of Gwyneed and Bethan has proposed to Haydn to marry her so that they can stop her stepfather's evil tyranny, but it seems that a love is starting to blossom between them!

Out of all the stories I have read in this book, this story was my favorite! Adrienne Basso has done an excellent job at creating an exciting plot throughout the book and I was seriously on the edge of my seat as I was trying to figure out whether or not Bethan and Haydn will succeed at dethroning de Bellemare! The character I really loved the most in this book was Haydn as he truly has a muscular body (which I like!) and he truly loved Bethan's courageous spirit in defeating her stepfather which made him into such an honorable character. I also loved the sexual scenes between Haydn and Bethan (I mean, what romance novel would not have sex scenes?) as they were truly hot and spicy!

The reason why this story did not get a five star rating is because of the heroine, Bethan. She was alright, when we first meet her because she was so courageous when she took matters in her hands to help out the innocent people that her stepfather wanted to kill. Unfortunately, when she got older, she became sort of wimpy and wanted Haydn to solve her problems instead of trying to help Haydn defeat her stepfather. Also, what made me so frustrated about Bethan's character was when she realized what Haydn really is, she just decided to not trust him just because he revealed his true form to her. I mean, I also believe that there should be trust in a relationship, but there is also the fact that spouses should accept each other for who they are no matter what and Bethan does not seem to understand that fact about Haydn. Overall, “Bride of the Beast” is a great story, but I would give the story a five star rating, while the heroine of the story gets a three star rating.

Kiss of the Vampire by Eve Silver – 3 stars 

Sarah Lowell started working at King's College Hospital after her father died and strange things strated happening at the hospital when someone is killing the weakest patients by draining their blood and surgeon Killian Thayne is the prime suspect! However, Sarah will soon discover that Killian Thayne is no ordinary man!

Out of all the stories I have read from this book, this was the weakest story I have read and there is not much to say about what I liked about this story other than the fact that I liked the mystery aspect of the story as it includes the typical “Who did it?” murder scenario and Eve Silver did a great job at bringing out the drama in this story. Also, there is plenty of hot sexual scenes between Killian and Sarah that will have your love senses flare up with excitement!

The reason why this story was not a five star read is because the story was a bit boring to read through as there is rarely any action in the story and the plot sort of dragged on too much. Also, I felt that the characters were not lively enough and they sort of fell flat as they rarely have any personality that would make them stand out in the story. Even though both Sarah and Killian are kindhearted characters, they rarely shown any true personality and therefore, they just came out as being sort of background characters throughout the entire story. I also felt that the ending was extremely weak as even though we find out who was killing all the patients, it did not really deliver that punch that I would expect from a mystery story and it felt like it was just thrown in the story to just give the story a happy ending without really explaining about the clues that lead up to the revelation of the suspect. Overall, “Kiss of the Vampire” was not the best story in this novel and it was just an average story.

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• The Bride by Julie Garwood

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