5 Dogs Book Blog

Kenzie and Gennaro book 1 A review by Elleanore G. Vance CW: this book uses a variety of slurs (1-2 whole pages of n-word slurs somewhere in the middle, and a few more sprinkled throughout, among others ), domestic abuse, transactional sex, abuse of power, parental abuse of a minor, sexual abuse of a minor, sexual assault and sexual trafficing. Should you decide to read this book, know that some of these are plot points and may be upsetting. This may not be the book for you. Patrick Kenzie is a private detective whose office is in the belfrey of the neighborhood catholic church. His partner is childhood BFF, Angela Gennaro, who is married to former pal Phil.  (It is not a happy union.  More on that later)  The pair are hired by a trio of politicans who want them to recover some documents purloined by a former employee.  While in search of the documents and the woman who took them,  Patrick and Angie confront personal demons.  Then they get a scrap of a ...

by Dorothy Gilman Mrs. Polifax #1 a review by Elleanore G. Vance Emily Polifax is afraid to take her geraniums to the roof of her apartment building in New Brunswick, New Jersey because thenprecipice was entirely too inviting that one time.  Whennher doctor sees the change in her, knowing that she is recently widowed with adult children, he suggests  she try a new hobby. Something she's always wanted to do; charitable work, the arts, and tavelling are among his suggestions. But what has Emily Polifax always wanted to do? Her dearest childhood ambition? Why, to be a spy, of course! So she boards a bus to Langley, letter of introduction from her senator in hand. She wasn't  supposed to meet Mr. Carstairs, she was supposed to talk to an underling and be given a tour, then sent on her way. Mr. Carstairs happens to meet her when he barges into the conference room she is waiting in, believing her to be a retired feild agent reporting for a courier job. The courier is to g...

 A retrospective by Elleanore G. Vance Gene Stratton-Porter was the Nora Roberts of her era, having sold more than 10 Million copies by the time of her death in 1924. She was Disney before Disney was Disney; a rare artist who got to enjoy the popularity of her work and the riches it brought. Born August 17, 1863 in Wabash County Indiana, young Geneva was fascinated by the natural world around her. The locals would come to call her The Bird Woman due to her own prowess with healing and raising local birds.  In 1884, Gene met Charles Porter; two years later they married, and a year after that their only child Jeanette was born. Sometime after that, Gene began writing nature pieces for magazines, learned photography and watercolor so that her pieces weren't just illustrated, but illustrated with lifelike full color. Her first accredited novel was Song of the Cardinal in 1903. She would go on to write eleven more novels, eight nature studies, two books of Poetry, and four collec...

A Review by Elleanore Vance  This past January (2021) when the skies were grey and the temps were low, I wanted a book to match. Winter Tide was very much that.  A sequel to an online fan fiction called The Litany of Earth ,  this novel fleshed out what Litany left bone. To know what's what,  i highly suggest reading Lovecraft's Shadow over Innsmouth first.  I suppose you might be able to follow what's going on without it,  but having the background makes it so much easier.  Ruthanna Emrys chose a pair of siblings from Innsmouth as her protagonists: the only known survivors of the Marsh family. Aphra, the elder,  and Caleb her younger brother,  who was so young when their family was incarcerated that all his childhood memories are from the camps.  They survived the internment camps that killed their natal family, and manage to build a new one when they are joined by Japanese Americans,  held against their will,  during WWII...

A review by Elleanore G Vance In my younger days, Mrs Frisby called out to me from a stack of books my high-school library was culling. I had permission from the librarian to take as many as I wanted; and I did! ( I crammed my locker full every day, and packed them all home stuffed in my backpack over the next several weeks until the charity shop came to pick up the ones I had yet to get to. I still mourn those stories lost to time) I read it that summer, as we crossed Lake Michigan aboard the S.S. Badger.  I have read it several times since then, and each time something different stands out to me. I say this as a warning who might choose to read this as a bedtime book with the children in your life. Mrs. Jonathan Frisby is a field mouse, a recent widow and mother of three. Mrs. Frisby is adjusting to her widow-hood, when Timothy, her youngest, falls ill late in the winter. As he fails to improve, with Spring fast approaching, Mrs. Frisby seeks help from a friend of her husband. ...

A review by Elleanore G. Vance I wanted a springtime book and my hubby told me that Jerusalem Maiden will fit the bill. Specifically, I would get Springtime in Paris. That was the only thing he was right about. Our story follows young Esther, a child of eleven or so, a Jewess in an orthodox community in British  Palestine, where Israel would be in a few short decades. She longs to be an artist and has lessons with a woman who lives nearby; but she knows that it is an aspiration she can never attain. Aside from the whole no Graven Images thing, she and every girl in her community is groomed to accept being a child bride whose highest calling is to be a brood mare. Esther's destiny, and all of the Jewish girls' destiny is to be fruitful that the Messiah may be born.  This is what is referred to as being a Jerusalem Maiden. No matter where Esther turns, she has no real choice. Esther is torn her whole life between the life she must conduct herself in for her community, and the...

Fred is not an Anne Rice style vamipre. Nor is he a glittery vampire. Fred is a geeky vampire. He wears sweater vests and refuses to give up his glasses because he just doesnt look like himself without them. He even indulges  in his taste for fine wine and cheese having discovered that his vampire physiology treats human food like the human system treats chewing gum.  In fact the biggest difference between Alive Fred and Unalive Fred is that instead of working for one of the biggest accounting firms in Winslow, Colorado, he now owns his own. The first in a, currently, 6 book series, U, U, &U is told as a series of vignettes.  In the first, we go with Fred to his Highschool Reunion over Halloween; likely the last he will attend. The second involves a group of  LARPers who have met in a park to play. Fred and a Friend show up to play along.  The third,  takes us to Las Vegas. Similar to the first act of a Heist movie,  this first book is very much ...