Kindle First

[Jessica Lares]

Pffft. The reviews for Wreckage are coming in. That's the last time I read an editor's comments.

[Dngrsone]

I'm liking Dead Key so far. Think I have solved one of the mini mysteries (the symbology at the bottom of the page) and I am only 41% of the way through.

[Manabi]

Originally Posted by Jessica Lares

Pffft. The reviews for Wreckage are coming in. That's the last time I read an editor's comments.

I honestly never read those comments, I find them to be pretty useless.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by Jessica Lares

Pffft. The reviews for Wreckage are coming in. That's the last time I read an editor's comments.

I just glanced at the reviews; they look overwhelmingly positive. So I'm curious what your issue is with the editor's comments. (I didn't read through the reviews so as to avoid spoilers.)

[peachiekene]

Usually the Kindle First reviews are over the top positive. I don't really trust Amazon for book reviews.

This is the first time I've been torn between all 4 books though. O_O

[Dngrsone]

Well, for what it's worth, I thoroughly enjoyed The Dead Key.

[Manabi]

This month's Kindle First selections are out, they are:

Younger by Suzanne Munshower [Genre: Thriller]

When PR pro Anna Wallingham gets dumped by her last client, she finds herself running out of options in LA, where looks trump experience. Desperate to prove she is still relevant, the fiftysomething accepts a shady job offer from Pierre Barton, secretive billionaire owner of Barton Pharmaceuticals. Isolated in a facility outside London, she agrees to test a new top-secret product guaranteed to make her look thirty years younger. Anna is starting to look on the outside the way she feels on the inside: ageless. But she soon discovers that her predecessor died under mysterious circumstances, leading her to research just who stands to gain—and lose—with this miraculous product. When Pierre drops dead in front of her, she takes off on a dangerous journey across Europe hoping to stay alive long enough to uncover the truth.

With the hard-won knowledge that younger isn’t always better, Anna is determined to escape and reclaim her life before it’s too late.

Helen of Sparta by Amalia Carosella [Genre: Historical Fiction]

Long before she ran away with Paris to Troy, Helen of Sparta was haunted by nightmares of a burning city under siege. These dreams foretold impending war—a war that only Helen has the power to avert. To do so, she must defy her family and betray her betrothed by fleeing the palace in the dead of night. In need of protection, she finds shelter and comfort in the arms of Theseus, son of Poseidon. With Theseus at her side, she believes she can escape her destiny. But at every turn, new dangers—violence, betrayal, extortion, threat of war—thwart Helen’s plans and bar her path. Still, she refuses to bend to the will of the gods.

A new take on an ancient myth, Helen of Sparta is the story of one woman determined to decide her own fate.

It Had to Be Him by Tamra Baumann [Genre: Romance]

Even though Meg Anderson’s hell-raising days are over, coming home to Anderson Butte isn’t easy, especially when her impossible-to-please dad is the mayor and her do-gooder siblings run the place. But with another job lost and the gorgeous father of her daughter trying to make contact after disappearing three years ago, a break is definitely in order. Hopefully the little town filled with big, juicy secrets can help.

After being off the grid for years, Josh Granger, a man with his own secrets, wants Meg and his daughter back. But first he has to get past townspeople as protective as a pack of rottweilers. He’s not the man Meg thinks he is, but he can’t tell her why…not yet.

As Meg slowly warms to Josh, it’s clear the old spark is still there. But when his secret is exposed—along with Meg’s own shocking revelation—will it tear their family apart again, or bind them forever?

The Gemini Effect by Chuck Grossart [Genre: Science-Fiction Thriller]

2014 Winner — Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award — Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror

A single raindrop opens a Pandora’s box when the spawn of perverse genetic research performed during World War II is unleashed on an unsuspecting modern world. By dawn, only a dead city remains, eerily quiet and still, except for mutant beasts that hide from the light, multiply, and await the shadows of night to continue their relentless advance.

Ordered to investigate the unfolding crisis, biowarfare specialist Carolyn Ridenour barely escapes the creatures’ nocturnal onslaught, saved in the nick of time by Colonel Garrett Hoffman, who lost hundreds of his troops to a swarm that neither bombs nor bullets can stop.

As Carolyn and Garrett race to stop the plague, a battered and broken government prepares to release the fury of America’s nuclear arsenal on its own soil and its own citizens.

The Gemini Effect was originally published as The Mengele Effect. This edition has been completely edited and revised, including significant plot changes.

The page says that Amazon is allowing Prime members to pick two books again this month. This may be the new regular.

[peachiekene]

The Mengele Effect

O_O Kind of glad they changed the title - that is off putting.
(Even if it makes sense context wise)

Grabbed Helen of Troy - now trying to decide between Younger and The Gemini Effect.

[Manabi]

I went with both Younger and The Gemini Effect. I agree, The Mengele Effect sounds awful.

[Demingy]

This month was an easy decision for me (and unfortunately none of them seemed as interesting as the past couple months' selections). Went with Younger and The Gemini Effect as well.

[Dngrsone]

I took Helen and Gemini... none of them are as enticing as the batch from last month, but...

[Blossom]

Finally something I can read. It's been awhile since I gotten anything.
I got Helen of Sparta and It Had To Be Him.

[Catlady]

They all sound pretty uninteresting. I got Younger. I didn't click through on anything else to read the additional information, but now that I've learned that The Gemini Effect has a WWII connection, I'll probably get that one--the Mengele Effect title would have triggered my attention right off the bat since it's got specificity and I would have made an association with Ira Levin's Boys from Brazil.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by Catlady

[T]he Mengele Effect title would have triggered my attention right off the bat since it's got specificity and I would have made an association with Ira Levin's Boys from Brazil.

I agree completely (though I'm disinclined to read a single book that KF has offered so far -- too many others are more important to me and others still will always jostle their way into my queue).

The Gemini Effect is generic and has been used many times by companies, entrepreneurs, novelists, filmmakers, TV show creators, those who write the episodes, songwriters, etc.

Whereas The Mengele Effect is odd enough to stand out and also repeats an alliterative short e that creates a kind of drumbeat: tuh-TUH-tuh-TUH-tuh-TUH. Here's how a drummer would count it: uh-one-ee-and-uh-two.

All of that makes the title memorable for me. Never mind the questions that arise when you ponder what the Mengele effect might be (twins who survived modifications that turned them inadvertently into mythical beings?). K.W. Jeter wrote a book that's a bit like that (though it's called The Kingdom of Shadows).

[Brendan Moody]

I went with Younger and The Gemini Effect. I had actually read an excerpt of the latter when it was part of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest, for which I was one of the early-round judges. (In three years of doing the contest, it was the only entry I read that actually won, or even made it to the finals.) So I'm curious to see what the whole thing is like.