book reviews

Novel by M. Lee Buompensiero

Reviewed by Pennell Paugh

March 6, 2025 (San Diego) -- Long-time San Diego resident, M. Lee Buompensiero has released an award-winning novel, Sumerland. The story is full of romance, unusual hauntings, heart-warming dog crises and mishaps.

Kate Post inherits the San Diego historical Liebersohn mansion after her mother, whom she rarely saw and barely knew, dies. Kate doesn't want the house, nor any reminder of her mother's abandonment. Leaving with every intention of returning to San Francisco, Kate stumbles and falls in front of the house. An odd inscription etched in concrete beside a garden pathway catches her eye; it haunts her dreams and changes her mind. She will do a period restoration on the house and make for a quick sale. This will take it off her hands for good.

Francis and Marie-Claire Liebersohn have unfinished business—they want someone to set the record straight seventy years after their deaths. Their hauntings reveal family secrets and awaken Kate to paranormal realities. Prompted by her friend, Lulu, Kate adopts a new mission to set matters right for living relatives, including herself.

Kate’s romance with her dog’s vet seems real life. The dog that pulls Kate into committing to a totally new life is endearing. The melting of Kate’s heart by the dog is realistic and heartwarming. The disturbing hauntings that Kate witnesses turn out to have a positive purpose. I loved this story. I couldn’t put it down.

Below is an excerpt from the novel:

“I turned to look back at the old house. Even in its shabby state, you’d be blind not to see that it had been magnificent at one time. I tried to imagine the grand old Craftsman dismantled, torn down and replaced with a cookie-cutter row of faux-French chateau townhouses. Something inside knotted my stomach. Guilt? I shrugged that off and considered the renovations needed to convert the place into a B&B.

“It might not be so crazy after all. Of course, I’d have to hire a manager to run it. But do I want to?

“The logical right side of my brain took over What? Are you nuts? Focus! You don’t want this. Think about it—the time, energy and money. I did the math. I was perfectly happy with my current career path—the sterile landscape of investment counseling. No personal attachments. The black and white, plusses and minuses, the safe uninvolved terrain of advising clients about solid investments. Simple. No emotional ties.

“This wasn’t anything like that. This bound me to my mother. My stomach twitched again. I did a quick mental one-eighty back to my original plan, which was to settle what business needed settling and get back to San Francisco, where my job and condo and lifestyle await. Not that many would call twelve-hour workdays and little free time for cultural or romantic involvement a lifestyle. Still, it was my world and I wanted to get back to it. I needed to retreat to the familiar, the safe, the unattached—the total opposite of this … house.

“I don’t owe this house or mother my time or money.

“That sealed it. I’d have Lizbeth list the property. I turned and started back up the path when I caught my foot on something, tripped, and landed face down in a tangle of withered hydrangeas at the foot of the stairs.

“’Oh, Kathryn,” Lizbeth squealed “Are you all right?’

“I scrambled to my feet, more embarrassed than damaged, and brushed off the remnants of dirt and debris. When I bent to pick up my satchel, I noticed something scrawled in concrete. It was partially hidden by the bushes. I pushed the dead brush aside and stared at the initials in a sketchy scrawl etched into the concrete: “WJL.” Above that: ‘Sumerland – 1941.’”

The author, M. Lee Buompensiero, is a third-generation San Diegan. She has supported the writing arts as a volunteer at the San Diego Writers and Editors Guild. For her many years as managing editor for the Guild’s annual anthology, The Guilded Pen, and for her efforts while serving on the Guild’s board, she received a Rhoda Riddell Builders Award.

Buompensiero also writes under the pen name, “Loren Zahn,” and is the author of the Theo Hunter Mystery Series: Dirty Little Murders, Deadly Little Secrets, and Fatal Little Lies.

By Jacob Hubbard

Reviewed by Pennell Paugh

February 24, 2025 (San Diego) - Long-time San Diego resident Jacob Hubbard has written a debut novel, Sounds of Yesterday, about a romantic relationship during COVID as experienced by an autistic man.

For five years, Rob and Ana overcome career challenges, achieve emotional stability, and survive a global pandemic. Though they each achieve successes, Ana ends their relationship.

Rob’s world is shattered. He blames himself. Traumas are reopened, and forgotten insecurities play center stage in his thoughts.

As he mourns, he comes to see that Ana worked in an abusive workplace and had a harsh, demanding mother. Unable to share about the pains in her life, she slowly falls into a depression, and becomes unable to give or receive love.

Below is an excerpt of the novel:

“Later in the evening after dinner, I put Don McLean’s American Pie on my dad’s vinyl player. I felt immersed in the song until it reminded me of the night I listened to it with Ana when she asked me why I listened to music like this.

“’The way I see it now,’ I said. ‘The reason I listen to older music is because when I take the time to listen to the sounds of yesterday, they make me remember the promises of tomorrow.’

“‘What kind of promises?’ Ana asked.

“’… the promise of a better future, and the promise that everything will be okay, no matter what …’

“I pulled out my phone and found myself looking at her photos. As the music played, snapshots of everything Ana and I have been through over the years flashed here and there in my thoughts. I saw images of us cuddling in bed, laughing and giggling, of us going to the art festival by the waterfront, riding bikes by the beach, and taking selfies at museums. I saw flashes of restaurants we explored and trips we went on, an image of us together when we saw Poets of the Fall.

I couldn’t stop thinking about the night I comforted her when she cried in my arms.”

“Today

“Last night, I dreamt Ana and I watched the sunset at Ocean Beach Pier.

“’Has work gotten better?’ I asked.

“’Kinda but not really,’ she said. ‘I’ll tough it out, hope for the best.’

“’Yeah. Have things gotten better with your mom?’

“Ana just shrugged, not saying anything as we watched the sunset.”

Sounds of Yesterday shows the everyday highs and lows in a relationship as it is experienced by an autistic man—a person who tends to berate and reject himself. This book vividly shows a couple struggle to love one another until life itself crushes one of them. We experience the intensity of loss the main character has when love is lost.

Sounds of Yesterday is Hubbard’s debut novel.

Hubbard is a neurodivergent (autistic) writer and college writing teacher living in the San Diego Metro area. With a Bachelors in English and a Masters in Rhetoric from San Diego State University, he has developed a love of writing in all its forms.

As an advocate, Hubbard has made neurodiversity an important theme in his writing and teaching to help spread awareness of neurodivergence.

When he is not writing or teaching, he loves hiking, traveling, browsing his local indie bookstore, and playing video games like Elden Ring and Dark Souls.

By Wanjirũ Warama

Reviewed by Pennell Paugh

January 1, 2025 (La Mesa) -- Wanjiru Warama a resident of La Mesa, provides true stories of how her family and community lived in abject poverty on British colonial farms in Kenya in her novel, The Colonial Farm. Her historic memoir sheds light on the struggles of Kenyan farmworkers and rural populations under the British colonial rule. She then covers how Kenya’s rulership developed after the British retreated from governing.

Below is an excerpt from the novel:

“Before colonization, Kenya had no plantations for children to work in and earn money. People lived in clusters of extended families and worked only on their own lands unless friends did merry-go-rounds at each other’s projects. Without full-time jobs elsewhere, parents did most of the hard work and eased their children into work without burdening them unduly.

“But during my time, in the fifties and sixties, our parents needed us children to help them not only garden and harvest but also earn extra money. “Hard work killed nobody,” they said. Discipline (a euphemism for beating or assaulting a child) and work, the village culture claimed, molded a child into a responsible human being. Or the Christians evoked “Spare the rod, spoil the child” nonsense.

“Later in my adulthood, I heard an occasional misguided adult say, “My parents beat me, and look at me now? I turned out okay.” I bet people make such statements to make light of the assaults and damage they suffered.

“Regarding child labor, one would expect that because Kenya was a British colony, the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), also known as child labor laws enacted in England in 1938, would apply. But the law applied to British children, not African children in the colonies like us. Our parents didn’t know of such laws; individual parents set the standards. Major Miller, like the rest, employed children as young as ten.

“My siblings and I complained about the hard work, but the hardest hit were the unlucky children whose fathers couldn’t afford school fees (at twenty-two shillings per pupil per year from 1956) or didn’t see the need for educating potential farmhands. The children worked full-time. They dug, weeded, and picked coffee cherries alongside their parents or other adults eight to nine hours a day, six days a week. Some landowners, like the famous author of Out of Africa, Karen Blixen (pen name Isak Dinesen, 1885-1962), besides plantation jobs, employed small boys as domestic trainees.”

Warama shows the lives of overworked native groups while describing the lives of her family members, including herself. Despite the odds of an African living in 1950s Kenya, where education for a girl was an afterthought, Warama managed to use education to escape a life of drudgery.

The book is astonishingly positive given the abject poverty under which Warama and her siblings suffered. She tells a compelling story. I look forward to reading the author’s personal story—how she continued her education and eventually immigrated to the United States.

Author Wanjiru Warama has written five books and one personal essay. The Colonial Farm is the latest in her The Colonized series. A philanthropist, Warama is a member of The Rotary Club, a lifetime member of the Friends of the San Diego Public Library, and a benefactor of Gitura Secondary and Gitura Primary schools in Kenya.

East County News Service

January 21, 2025 (San Diego) – New York Times bestselling author Caitlin Rother, an investigative journalist and former San Diego Union-Tribune reporter, will release an updated edition of her true-crime book, Body Parts, on February 25.  The book takes a deep psychological look at serial killer Wayne Adam Ford, a trucker who confessed to killing four prostitutes picked up along California roads.

The new edition contains information on the identity of Ford’s first victim, who has finally been identified by the Humboldt County Sheriff’s through forensic genetic genealogy 25 years after her body was found by a boater.

For a year after her murder, detectives had no suspects until one evening in November 1998, when a 36-year-old former Marine walked into the Eureka sheriff’s station with a woman’s breast in his jacket pocket. Initially saying he had “hurt some people,” Wayne Adam Ford turned himself in, describing the gruesome details of repeatedly choking four young women during rough sex until they stopped breathing, reviving them with CPR, then doing it again.

Ford told authorities that after torturing and repeatedly choking and reviving dozens of prostitutes with CPR during sex, four of them didn’t survive, he said, claiming that was an accident. After dismembering two of his victims, he dumped their bodies in the California Aqueduct and other waterways in Humboldt, Kern, San Joaquin, and San Bernardino Counties. Ford's complex death penalty case made national news because he is one of the only serial killers to turn himself in and help authorities identify his victims. He was recently transferred from death row at San Quentin to a state prison in San Luis Obispo.  

Originally released in March 2009, this new edition of Body Parts has been updated with 32 pages of developments about the identification of Kerry Anne Cummings, Ford’s first victim, whom he dismembered. The new material takes the reader through the investigative process involved in solving a cold case like this one so many years after the fact. The victim’s family has closure after so many years of not knowing what happened to her, and being prevented from reporting her missing to police because she was using drugs. Rother is the first writer to interview the Cummings family about her troubled life before she went missing in late 1997.

Overall, this book is based on exclusive information Rother uncovered during her extensive research and exclusive interviews with key players, including Ford’s father and brother. She also interviewed, the prosecutor, sheriff's detectives from all four counties, the defense’s sole investigator, and a woman who survived after being raped and tortured by Ford.  By obtaining a court order to release sealed court files and digging through boxes of evidence and investigators’ reports, Rother was able to paint comprehensive and compelling portraits of Ford, his family and his victims. Her book shows readers how Ford’s family dynamics, his severe head injury, his bouts of mental illness, and his compulsive sexual perversions led to his tragic killing spree, tearful confessions, and dramatic trial.

Rother has written or co-authored 15 books including Death on Ocean Boulevard, Hunting Charles Manson, Then No One Can Have Her, I’ll Take Care of You, Lost Girls, Poisoned Love, Dead Reckoning, Twisted Triangle, Where Hope Begins/Deadly Devotion, Naked Addiction, and My Life, Deleted

Her next title, Down to the Bone, about the murders of the McStay family of San Diego County,  comes out in June 2025. The author of narrative non-fiction crime, thrillers, and memoir, Rother also has the first two books in a new series of crime novels coming out in 2026, starting with Dopamine Fix (Thomas & Mercer). Her most recent title is Death on Ocean Boulevard, which was optioned by Untitled Entertainment. An award-winning investigative newspaper reporter for 19 years,

Rother’s journalism has been published in Cosmopolitan, the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, The San Diego Union Tribune, The Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, and The Daily Beast. Her more than 250 TV, radio and podcast appearances include 20/20, People Magazine Investigates, Crime Watch Daily, Australia's World News, and numerous shows on Netflix, Investigation Discovery, Lifetime, HLN and REELZ. For more information, visit her website: https://caitlinrother.com

What critics are saying

“With a seasoned journalist's doggedness and a novelist's ear for drama, Caitlin Rother paints every page with all the violent colors of a malignant sociopath's fever and captures what all too often is hidden right in plain sight,” says NYT bestselling author Ron Franscell. “This kind of frightening and fascinating glimpse into a killer's mind is rare, and an extremely intuitive Rother makes the most of it.”

“Caitlin Rother is the model for serious crime journalism today. She's bold, meticulous, and exhaustive, returning to cases with loose ends to update us on the latest innovations and developments,” says Katherine Ramsland, bestselling author. 

“The updated material in this new edition of Body Parts not only brings the story full circle by giving a name, face, and tragic backstory to the mystery that set the nightmare in motion, it adds another layer of depth,” says Simon Read, author of In the Dark. “Caitlin Rother never lets the horrific nature of the crimes overshadow the humanity of the victims… Rother explores Ford's savage career in chilling detail… Her fast-paced narrative and the brutality of Ford's rampage come together in a book crime aficionados will be loathe to put down.  A story this shocking can only be true.”

“Rother has produced a superior study of the formation of a serial killer and his lost and lonely victims,” says Carol Anne Davis, author of Sadistic Killers. “You’ll want to lock up your daughters—and raise your sons with respect and compassion – after reading about the depraved acts of Wayne Adam Ford.”

“As with all of her nonfiction, Caitlin Rother delivers page-turning excitement and blood curdling terror once again,” says M. William Phelps, author of Bad Girls. “Using a reporter's edge, a novelist's eye, and a crime-scene investigator's nose for evidence, Rother's latest is all at once riveting, unbelievable, fast-paced, and sure to keep you up at night wondering how evil seems to top itself time and again."

BODY PARTS by Caitlin Rother

On sale date: February 25, 2025 

Price: $18.95, a Citadel Press trade paperback

ISBN: 978-0806543918

Novel by Mark O’Bannon

Reviewed by Pennell Paugh

January 19, 2025 (San Diego)—San Diego resident Mark O’Bannon has released a new science fiction romance, Touching Infinity  (Imperium Prequels).

In a society where arranged marriages are considered more sensible and enduring, Alastronia DeTroyes, a young planetary scientist, is excited to find herself traveling into a system that she has predicted will explode soon into a supernova.

Over the course of the novel, Alastriona corresponds with her sister, Julia.

Below is an excerpt from the novel:

“’We’ll decide what’s best for you,” Théophile said.

“’The Chinese call these types of marriages, ‘máng hūn.’”

“’Yeah, that translates as, ‘blind marriage,’” said Julie. “Not for me, thanks.”

“Their mother shook her head in exasperation. “No one wants their children making rash decisions to marry someone because of passion or lust. In an arranged marriage, you will stay together forever.”

           “’What about love?” asked Julie.

“’Don’t be naive, Julie. There’s no such thing as true love,” said Théophile. “That’s just a silly romantic fantasy.”

            Julie stopped arguing and devoted her attention to her food.

“Alastriona tried to get her sister to understand. “There are two kinds of love: The first kind is frivolous, romantic love. That kind of love leads to madness and suffering. The second kind is the stable form of love that is the result of careful planning.”

“Julie found her voice. “But love isn’t supposed to make sense. If you start a fire, you can’t control where it goes. You should follow your passions, sis. Don’t you want to fall wildly in love with someone?”

“Alastriona shook her head. “Of course not. I have no patience for crazy love. It’s pointless and irresponsible.”

“Chantel, chimed in. “Husbands and wives fall in love with each other after the wedding takes place in order to sustain their marriage. You know the divorce rates for provincials are over fifty percent. Arranged marriages rarely result in a divorce. You know the statistics as well as anyone, Julie.”

“’That reminds me,” said Théophile. “I have an announcement to make.” Théophile waved over a slave. The robot came over with a bottle of wine, which he displayed with a slight bow. Théophile nodded.

“The slave opened the bottle and poured him a sample. Théophile breathed in its aroma, tasted it, and smiled. He motioned for the slave to fill everyone’s glass. “Since this is a special occasion, I have brought out a bottle of Burgundian Pinot Noir all the way from Earth.”

“The slave went around pouring. Alastriona watched the robot fill her glass. She picked it up and inhaled the aroma, which reminded her of cherries and strawberries. She took a sip and closed her eyes, tasting mushrooms, pine, and just a hint of anise. It tasted like sunlight shining down on a grove of cherry trees. “What’s the occasion?” asked Julie.

           “’Alastriona is getting married,” said Théophile.

“Alastriona nearly choked on the wine. She set the glass down and coughed. “Désolé.”

“Feeling as if she had just been shoved off a high platform without an antigravity belt, Alastriona took a moment to regain her composure.

            “Chantel asked, “Aren’t you excited, Alastriona?”

            “’Of course,” she said. “It’s just a surprise, that’s all.”

 “’We’ve spent months searching for just the right man,” said Chantel. “We found one. He’s a Pure Strain Human from Earth.”

             “Théophile huffed. “You’re being redundant, Chantel.”

Pure Strain Humans where those who were born on Earth. They were the highest class of citizens and they enjoyed more benefits than the provincial citizens who were born on colony worlds. Pure Strain Humans were the highest class of elites in the Imperium.

Picking up her glass of wine, Alastriona leaned back in her chair. She looked outside at the storm raining down on the Scylanthians. The star HD 84117 was going down and the horizon was full of colors. Light glittered off wet bodies of the balloon-like people. The French colony world Scylanthia was warmed by a white F8V main sequence star in the constellation of Hydra. At 6,100 degrees Kelvin, it burned hotter and brighter than Sol, the homeworld of humanity. A world that she could never go to because she wasn’t a Pure Strain Human.

As Alastriona strikes out on her expedition into deep space, she wants to lose herself in the analysis of the imminent supernova. She discovers that her fiancé, a Pure Strain Human detective, has joined the expedition on a covert mission to uncover a traitor among them. Alastriona becomes thrown into a nightmare when a traitor on board assists aliens in their invasion of the galaxy.

Will Alastriona prevent the aliens from destroying all life in the galaxy?

Touching Infinity is a prequel novel in the epic science fiction series, Imperium.

I found the book to be a pleasurable read. The world O’Bannon creates is interesting, highly visual, and Alastronia’s days are full of romantic temptations by three men who are on board. Which one will she choose?

Mark O’Bannon is a screenwriter, game designer, and author of three fantasy series: Whiskers, Aia the Barbarian, and Shadows and Dreams. He is the CEO of Shadowstar Games, which publishes the Interactive Storytelling Game (a Pen & Paper Role Playing Game), Fantasy Imperium. He is an advocate of self-publishing and teaches workshops to aspiring authors to publish, market, and promote their works.

By Wanjirũ Warama

Reviewed by Pennell Paugh

January 1, 2025 (La Mesa) -- Wanjiru Warama a resident of La Mesa, provides true stories of how her family and community lived in abject poverty on British colonial farms in Kenya in her novel, The Colonial Farm. Her historic memoir sheds light on the struggles of Kenyan farmworkers and rural populations under the British colonial rule. She then covers how Kenya’s rulership developed after the British retreated from governing.

Below is an excerpt from the novel:

“Before colonization, Kenya had no plantations for children to work in and earn money. People lived in clusters of extended families and worked only on their own lands unless friends did merry-go-rounds at each other’s projects. Without full-time jobs elsewhere, parents did most of the hard work and eased their children into work without burdening them unduly.

“But during my time, in the fifties and sixties, our parents needed us children to help them not only garden and harvest but also earn extra money. “Hard work killed nobody,” they said. Discipline (a euphemism for beating or assaulting a child) and work, the village culture claimed, molded a child into a responsible human being. Or the Christians evoked “Spare the rod, spoil the child” nonsense.

“Later in my adulthood, I heard an occasional misguided adult say, “My parents beat me, and look at me now? I turned out okay.” I bet people make such statements to make light of the assaults and damage they suffered.

“Regarding child labor, one would expect that because Kenya was a British colony, the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), also known as child labor laws enacted in England in 1938, would apply. But the law applied to British children, not African children in the colonies like us. Our parents didn’t know of such laws; individual parents set the standards. Major Miller, like the rest, employed children as young as ten.

“My siblings and I complained about the hard work, but the hardest hit were the unlucky children whose fathers couldn’t afford school fees (at twenty-two shillings per pupil per year from 1956) or didn’t see the need for educating potential farmhands. The children worked full-time. They dug, weeded, and picked coffee cherries alongside their parents or other adults eight to nine hours a day, six days a week. Some landowners, like the famous author of Out of Africa, Karen Blixen (pen name Isak Dinesen, 1885-1962), besides plantation jobs, employed small boys as domestic trainees.”

Warama shows the lives of overworked native groups while describing the lives of her family members, including herself. Despite the odds of an African living in 1950s Kenya, where education for a girl was an afterthought, Warama managed to use education to escape a life of drudgery.

The book is astonishingly positive given the abject poverty under which Warama and her siblings suffered. She tells a compelling story. I look forward to reading the author’s personal story—how she continued her education and eventually immigrated to the United States.

Author Wanjiru Warama has written five books and one personal essay. The Colonial Farm is the latest in her The Colonized series. A philanthropist, Warama is a member of The Rotary Club, a lifetime member of the Friends of the San Diego Public Library, and a benefactor of Gitura Secondary and Gitura Primary schools in Kenya.