Review: Day 115 on an Alien World by Jeannette Bedard

Someone needs to be alive to call for help. 

A dishonourable discharge left Margo unable to find honest work on Earth. Signing onto a colonizing mission heading to a new world promised a fresh start. Or at least that's what she'd thought. 

Strapped into a crashing colony ship, she realized how wrong she'd been.

They hit the ground and the straight forward colonizing mission becomes a scramble for survival. Accidents keep happening—too many to blame on random bad luck. A trail of evidence leads Margo to a startling conclusion—one of her fellow colonists is a saboteur.

Tomorrow is the colony's first communications window with Earth and their only chance to send a message home. 

Will Margo stop the saboteur before it’s too late? 

Find out now.

***

I picked this one up on Netgalley because I was first interested in the cover. The lone colonist in a barren world. I was pleasantly surprised to find how well the two perspectives were woven together until the merge into a big bang of a finish.

We hear Margo's part in her own words beginning before the launch in her own words as her journal is read by another crew member after her transport crashes and she's proclaimed dead. The two pieces tie together and build intrigue in each other, tying the early misfortunes of the crew with the current happenings as their numbers dwindle. When the two pieces come together it feels like a breathless race to the finish.

If you love seeing what happens (particularly in space) when a bunch of incompatible people and their secrets are crammed together in a tight space with a steady stream of mayhem to set things off (as I do), then Day 115 on an Alien World doesn't disappoint.

I received my copy from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

Review: Constellation XXI by Edward Hoornaert

Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors, never verified, blamed her surprising decision on a boyfriend who got expelled from Keening.

Crispin Hunt, fleeing enemy forces, is greeted by a tugship captained by Sienna, his former girlfriend. Love rekindles—until an old betrayal boils up. Her ship loses power while aimed dead on at the space station, forcing Sienna to confront the terrifying truth about Crispin and his cargo…and her routine job suddenly becomes the most important in the entire galaxy.

Edward Hoornaert’s romantic space opera, Constellation XXI, continues the Repelling the Invasion saga of the Dukelsky family, begun in The Guardian Angel of Farflung Station and Escapee.

***

Constellation XXI is the third Edward Hoornaert SFR I have read and the most recent volume of his Repelling the Invasion series.


Hoornaert's characters are inherently good and easy to root for. It's what I like most about his stories. They are complex and real in ways I find easy to identify with. I've become very fond of the Farflung universe he's created and always enjoy settling back in to it and catching up with everyone.

Looking forward to the next one, this series is one I always watch for news on.

I received a copy from Netgalley in exchange for my review.

Review: The Step-by-Step Guide to 200 Crochet Stitches by Tracey Todhunter

I thought I'd give Tracey Todhunter's The Step-by-Step Guide to 200 Crochet Stitches a try when I found it available on Netgalley. I've always been a knitter, first and foremost, but have taken on learning basic crochet when a particular project jumped out at me and made me say "I have to make that!"

The book is beautifully put together from the colours standing out against the white background to the easy to read charts. (The charts gave me shudders at first as I've never tackled charted crochet before but within a few rows, I was reading the charts more than the written instructions.) It didn't take long to want to make everything so I picked up some contrasting yarn and randomly picked three. Pictures are below.

Todhunter's guide is a great addition to any craft library. Comprehensive and colourful and one you'll be picking up over and over.

35 Embossed Shells

107 Honeycomb

187 Flower Garden

I received a copy from Netgalley in exchange for my honest opinion.