Biographies and Memoirs

Mommy's Boy: How My Doggie Soulmate's Love Rescued Me

Jennifer Huston Schaeffer | Biographies and Memoirs

Jennifer Huston Schaeffer's memoir, Mommy's Boy, is a unique story of a bond between a woman and her canine son, a story of the transformative decade she spent with Benny, a rescued Westie-Maltese mix who became her “doggie soulmate.” Following heartbreaks and realizing traditional motherhood might not be her future, Jennifer adopts Benny in 2014, finding unconditional love that heals her loneliness. The narrative follows their journey from Chicago to Indianapolis, where Benny helps Jennifer pursue a romance with Brad. Together, they face Benny’s complex health battles, including pancreatitis and gallbladder surgery, treating him as their child. For how long can they keep Benny with them?...

Continue Reading

Most Recent Reviews

In the Wake of Evil

Stephanie Dean (Page Publishing)

| Reviewed by Elena Enger

In Stephanie Dean’s In the Wake of Evil, the once-vibrant town of Snickerdoodle—home to dandelion-born fairies, leaf-born pixies, unicorns, and humans—collapses into ruin after a forbidden friendship blossoms between the benevolent fairy Amethyst and the gentle pixie Bartholomew Jahosephat. After Bartholomew accidentally brews a transporting potion that sends him to Alabama, where he guards the human infant Chloe from her greedy uncle Winston, he returns to Snickerdoodle only to be betrayed by the envious fairy Onyx. Stripped of her gemstone na...

Flash 100: New Quick Fiction

Don Tassone (Independently Published)

| Reviewed by Sarah Harkness

is a collection of one hundred ultra-short stories, organized into “Yesterday,” “Today,” and “Tomorrow,” that distills human experience into potent, bite-sized narratives. In “Whole,” a man amputates a dead branch from a cherished cherry tree to save it, then applies that lesson to his own life. “Changing Fortunes” finds a millionaire and a dishwasher swapping bodies through a ghost’s wish-grant, discovering that youth and wealth both carry hidden costs. “The Man on TV” shocks an overindulgent executive into choosing health and family over exce...

Tyranny of the Mind: Self-Rule and the Common American Uprising

Julie A. Fragoules (Xaos Publishing)

| Reviewed by Cristina Prescott

Julie A. Fragoules’s Tyranny of the Mind: Self-Rule & The Common American Uprising is a sweeping, heavily documented treatise arguing that the United States is surrendering its founding ethos of individual liberty to a new, secular authoritarianism. Interweaving her immigrant family’s story with millennia of Western history, Fragoules traces how religious and state tyrannies—from the Roman Inquisition to feudal Europe—were rejected by the Enlightenment and America’s founders, who built a constitutional republic on liberty of conscience and...

Trolling for Murder (A Vashon Island Mystery)

Charlotte Stuart (Colvos Publishing)

| Reviewed by James Farlow

In Charlotte Stuart's Trolling for Murder, workplace investigator Lavender “Lew” Lewis discovers the body of Quin Armstrong at the base of Vashon Island's iconic Bird King Troll sculpture, a note declaring him “no friend of nature” taped to the wooden giant's pointing finger. When high school teacher Audrey Young becomes the prime suspect due to volatile confrontations about bullying, Lew digs into the victim's extensive list of enemies—from feuding neighbors to scorned developers—only to uncover that the killing resulted from decades of suppre...

Blogs

Dear Book Lover!

Welcome to The Book Commentary, home of the Best Books in over 200 categories. Thousands of books are published every month and we pick the best for you. We only recommend and publish reviews for books with ratings of 4-5 Stars. Join our growing community of thousands of readers, booksellers, and librarians and discover books that delight and shape readers like you!

About Us

The Book Commentary

The Book Commentary reviews and recommends books that are independently and traditionally published, as well as pre-publication manuscripts. We take pride in uncovering notable books from small presses that readers should pay attention to. We want readers to discover new books and talk about them. Our reviews are carefully crafted to highlight the strengths of the books and why readers should read them.

Authors can reprint their reviews on all their marketing materials and book covers, in whole or in part (provided no words are changed, and The Book Commentary is credited). The Book Commentary only publishes reviews that are rated 4-5 Stars. This means they only publish those reviews for books they strongly believe are worth readers' investments.