Showing posts with label book reviews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label book reviews. Show all posts

Sunday 7 October 2018

A wise man once said there are no perfect readers and there are no perfect writers


I was checking through my book reviews for my science fiction novel Zeeka Chronicles: Revenge of Zeeka on Amazon UK and US.
Admittedly, not all Amazon reviewers gave the book five stars.
A wise man once said 'there are no perfect readers and there are no perfect writers.' [Shiju H. Pallithazheth]

One reviewer said,” Fans of Twilight Zone and Outer Limits TV series episodes should find these shorts right up their alley.”
Another said.” I raced through this book - or more correctly I should say series of five books, bargain, as the story was so fast-moving and exciting.
On the odd occasions I did put it down to do other things, I found it had inspired my imagination.
It takes a special kind of author to invent the future-
I loved the shrinkenator idea.
There is so much going on in these books that this writer’s work will stick in your mind for a very long time.”
She gave the book 5 stars.

But the five-star review that really stunned me was this one.
“This was a strange read. Brenda Mohammed writes unlike anybody else I've read. She is such an incredible gift to this genre and is a great introduction if this isn't your usual brand of reading.
The characterization is spot on, even though the material is very futuristic, I still found myself recognising the flaws.
There were moments that reminded me of the work of M Night Shyamalan and that's what Mohammed does well - she creates stories that are easy to visualize. Fantastic. Definitely recommended."

I wondered who M Night Shyamalan was and I looked him up on the Internet.

Here is what I found: Manoj Nelliyattu Shyamalan born 6 August 1970) is an American film director, screenwriter, author, producer and actor known for making movies with contemporary supernatural plots and surprise endings. He was born in Puducherry, India and raised in Penn Valley, Pennsylvania.
His most well-received films include the supernatural horror thriller The Sixth Sense (1999), the superhero thriller Unbreakable (2000), the science fiction horror Signs (2002), and the historical drama-horror film The Village (2004).
For The Sixth Sense, Shyamalan received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director.
He was a producer for Devil (2010) and was instrumental in the creation of the Fox science fiction series Wayward Pines.
Shyamalan is also known for filming and setting his films in and around Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he was raised.
Most of his commercially successful films were co-produced and released by the Walt Disney Studios' Touchstone and Hollywood film imprints.
In 2008, Shyamalan was awarded the Padma Shri by the government of India.
I feel honoured to be compared with such a person.

In The Readers Favorite Book Award Contest, the book received an award in the category young adult thriller, and I quote from Readers Favorite: “The judges simply read the book and score it based on its merits.”

Follow Brenda Mohammed on AMAZON.CLICK HERE.




Thursday 18 January 2018

Before planning your next vacation read Travel Memoirs with Pictures.



BOOK DESCRIPTION:

Travel Memoirs with Pictures: Exploring the World is a book filled with reflections of the author's travels around the world.
She relates the family adventures and treats readers to a pictorial travel book of priceless memories.
She describes places visited and the wonderful times she and her family had in their tourist trips, not only in words but with an amazing photo collection.
The book is great to read while on a vacation or for some travel inspiration.

WHAT REVIEWERS ARE SAYING ABOUT TRAVEL MEMOIRS WITH PICTURES

A great and inspirational book!

Brenda Mohammed is an award-winning author who writes in many genres. While many people travel, few of us are capable of sharing our experience in a meaningful and relevant way with strangers. This author does a superb job.

Her book is very personal and one can feel as if a friend were relating her travel impressions and giving us her tips. Paradoxically, this personal and openly subjective touch makes the tips about restaurants and other commercial places for tourists sound less biased than a professional guidebook where it is often difficult to distinguish an honest review from a paid ad. In this book, we can read real first-hand accounts that are very precious to any explorers and travelers.

This book can inspire us when we plan our next vacation, it can also make us reflect on our own experience and realize what we might have missed when we visited a particular place, but it can also take us to places we do not have time or money to visit anytime soon. It’s also interesting to read a short entry about places that we consider our home since we cannot always see what makes them special unless we step away and look at them from a distance through a tourist’s eyes.

I found it exciting to read about places I visited and lived since the author has a keen eye and often notices thinks I don’t. But her chapter on Trinidad and Tobago, a place I have not been to, was probably the most interesting one to me. The author was born there and seems to know it very well. The ghost stories about the village of Lopinot make me want to visit and explore the place.

Enjoyable Memoirs of Author's Travels

An informative and enjoyable book to read. The author writes of her world travels with her family. She shares her experiences with the reader.
You'll read of the various sites to see in each location, the restaurants with delicious foods, and which restaurants are more reasonable in cost and which more expensive. She writes of the various ways to travel and of the climate of the location. You read her travels to different locations in the world:
Paris, Germany, Amsterdam (Holland), New York (USA), Los Angeles, California(USA), Las Vegas, Nevada (USA), London (United Kingdom), Toronto (Canada), Colorado (USA), New Orleans (USA), Italy, Spain, Miami (USA), Orlando (USA), Caribbean Vacations, Anguilla, Puerto Rico, Caracas, Barbados, Cruise to the Bahamas, Cartegena, Cruise to Cozumel (Mexico), Trinidad and Tobago.
Nearing the end of her book she ends with a delightful poem of her travels. This was a nice touch!

Loved this travel memoir!
This is a great travel memoir. The author has been so many amazing places! I loved her descriptions of Spain and Italy – two of my favorite destinations. She also included some terrific pictures. A 5-star travel memoir!

This is a family travelogue – a day by day recounting of flights, hotel stays, restaurants, shopping and tourist sites that the author and her extended family have experienced over the years. And they’ve been to a lot of places, including Italy, Spain, various locations in the US and the Caribbean Islands, among others. There are many down to earth descriptions of what it’s like to travel, even including getting sick or getting overheated. There are cautionary tales about such things as wearing comfortable shoes while walking in Venice because of the uneven cobblestone streets and not expecting an elevator to take you back down the mountain and possibly damaging your knees going down 296 steps. One especially interesting anecdote involved eating at a restaurant in Venice, thinking they were getting a nice fish meal for only 6 Euro each when it turned out that price was PER GRAM of fish. Meaning the family ended up paying a small fortune for seven meals. And there’s the embarrassing story about how the fire alarm went off in a Miami hotel, everyone dashing down the stairs to the parking lot, only to discover it was a false alarm. And to discover belatedly that the author was wearing a sheer nightgown. Another cautionary tale, perhaps. The author also includes family photos from most of their many vacations.

Travel Memoirs With Pictures is the second travelogue I have read this year, and just like the other book, readers will find themselves treated to a pictorial story as they go along. Some books like these tend to be 'photo-heavy' and rather redundant with the actual test.

In other words, pretty pictures alone do not make for a great book. So it's with pleasure that this book gives us insight into many countries.

I paid particular regard to places I had been to before in this book, for example, places like Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Italy, France (because I have been to these places before) and others.

Of the places I haven't yet been to, I would dearly love to go to Cartegena (in fact, thank you Author for putting this idea in my head!), but readers will have their own choices as they read the book.

Of course, the author has been to England and to my country's capital, London. As a national I must say that whilst London is definitely worth visiting, there are many gems in England that people don't know about. Aside from writing I do love to get out there and see what England....10 minutes drive in any direction from where I live, has to offer.

Travel Memoirs With Pictures offers readers a personal glance into one tourists view of many different places, and the different ways one can travel to them.

Recommended for anyone who has the travel bug!


This is a great way to learn about a real holiday/place experience.
Brenda Mohammed has such a personable way of describing her experiences from everything from restaurants, flights and hotels.
I enjoyed this very much and like all of her books, her natural style fully engaged me.
Very worthwhile and enjoyable.

A true travel memoir, which is filled with wonderful family memories anyone can appreciate. A fan of travel, the author takes us along on each trip as if we were right there with her. Great to read while on a vacation or when you just want to feel like you're on vacation.
Get the book at Amazon Universal Link.

Here is a Video Book Trailer.

Monday 15 January 2018

What Readers are saying about 'Retirement is Fun'



RETIREMENT IS FUN: When one door closes another opens.


1. An enjoyable account of retirement from an amazing author!
Ms. Mohammed recounts in great detail her decision to embark on a totally new career, with its ensuing challenges and rewards, after retiring from a successful career in banking.

2. It’s the web of family closeness facilitated by Brenda from which she draws strength in her darkest hour as she is afflicted with cancer and successfully grapples with retirement. It is in Brenda’s indefatigable efforts to champion the cause of family even as she journeys through a series sicknesses, births and deaths sequences and remains unfazed that a true hero is born.
3. "Retirement is Fun", is a seamless account of family life, hard work, and dedication. The author talks about her impressive career from banker to an insurance agent, to a lifetime member of the company that she worked for. Through it all, she beat the odds of life-threatening health problems.
4. Enlightening and inspiring, author Brenda Mohammed takes us through a bird's eye view turned fly on the wall look at her life. Banking? Insurance? Exotic holidays? For some of us, such a life is beyond our reach. For those of us to strive just be a little bit better at what we do, each and every day, we are the kind of reader suited to this book.
5. Anyone can read it, but you will be pleasantly surprised just how the author takes on new challenges with gusto. True, she has a large family and strong network of friends egging her on, but this is clearly her own tale, and how retirement is anything but a door closing.

6. After working for many years, it is difficult to pack up your job and leave an establishment, which became like a second home.
The author wondered what she would do when she retired at a very young age. It was the policy of the bank in those days.
The birth of her grandchildren brought much joy into her life. Her book is filled with inspiration and hope and it is one that everyone should read whether you are retiring or not.

8. Take a flight into the fascinating and fast-paced life of author Brenda Mohammed as she reflects on her years of early retirement. “Retirement is Fun” reads like a journal detailing the many aspects of Mohammed’s post-retirement days spent traveling the world. We follow her and her family as they globe-trot from their native Trinidad to the world’s largest cities, including Rome, London, and New York, to more exotic locations, such as Spain, Anguilla, and Columbia, and to popular tourist destinations like Hollywood and Las Vegas, as the author gives her impressions of each stop along the way.

9. "Retirement is Fun", is a seamless account of family life, hard work, and dedication. The author talks about her impressive career from banker to an insurance agent.
10. A well-written chronicle of the author's experiences and adventures since her retirement from a long career in the bank
This inspiring book tells of the many adventures experienced by the author after retiring from a banking career.
You can read the full reviews at Amazon Universal Link.
In case you have not yet read the book it is available at Amazon Universal Link and Books2Read Universal Link.

Here is the Video Book Trailer:



Monday 15 May 2017

Fascinating Memoirs written by Brenda Mohammed and Reviews


Book Review

My Life as a Banker
ByBookaholic on July 7, 2016
Format: Kindle Edition 5.0 out of 5.0 stars
My Life As A Banker: A Life Worth Living is a fascinating, intimate story. The author has an engaging writing style that draws you into the story and you feel as though she is talking directly to you, the reader. There is a nice balance between the professional and the personal and while I found the professional aspects rewarding, the highlight for me was reading about the author's interesting life.

The social history aspects of the book also fascinated me, particularly the descriptions of life in Trinidad and I would image that this memoir will serve as an important document for social historians in years to come.

This might sound strange to say about a book with Banker in the title, but the author demonstrates quite vividly that there are far more important things than money in life.


BOOK REVIEW

The book takes the reader on a journey of fun and adventure through many travels
By L.K on October 6, 2014
Format: Kindle Edition 5.0 out of 5.0 stars
Retirement is Fun: A New Chapter, is a seamless account of family life, hard work, and dedication. The author talks about her impressive career from banker to an insurance agent, to a lifetime member of the company that she worked for. Through it all, she beat the odds of life-threatening health problems. The book takes the reader on a journey of fun and adventure through many travels, work, and family life, that make retirement seem worthwhile.Roza K.


Book Review

TRAVEL MEMOIRS WITH PICTURES Exploring the World By Brenda Mohammed

By Josephine Calabrese on February 15, 2017
Format: Kindle Edition|Verified Purchase
5.0 out of 5.0 stars

Enjoyable Memoirs of Author's Travels

An informative and enjoyable book to read. The author writes of her world travels with her family. She shares her experiences with the reader.
You'll read about the various sites to see in each location, the restaurants with delicious foods, and which restaurants are more reasonable in cost and which more expensive. She writes about the various ways to travel and of the climate of the location. You read her travels to different locations in the world:
Paris, Germany, Amsterdam (Holland), New York (USA), LosAngeles, California(USA), Las Vegas, Nevada (USA), London (United Kingdom), Toronto (Canada), Colorado (USA), New Orleans (USA), Italy, Spain, Miami (USA), Orlando (USA), Caribbean Vacations, Anguilla, Puerto Rico, Caracas, Barbados, Cruise to the Bahamas, Cartegena, Cruise to Cozumel (Mexico), Trinidad and Tobago.

Nearing the end of her book she ends with a delightful poem of her travels. This was a nice touch!



Book Review

completed on:
02/16/2017
Review Rating:
5 stars! Download your free 5 Star Seal.Reviewed By Mamta Madhavan for Readers' Favorite

I Am Cancer Free by Mrs. Brenda C. Mohammed is the poignant memoir of the author's personal battle with cancer. Her faith in God and proving that ovarian cancer need not be a death sentence are what make this memoir a heartrending read. The author's 'never say die' attitude, the decision not to give up in life, and finally being cancer-free will encourage everyone who has been diagnosed with the disease or who has suffered from cancer. The memoir recounts from the time of diagnosis the experiences the author went through during the treatment, her emotions, fears, finances, until the successful treatment of the disease. It is a courageous story of survival, faith, and strength.

The author chronicles every step of her journey methodically, without leaving anything out, making the narration very personal, honest, and palpable to readers. The presence of God in everyone's life, a positive attitude, and the power of prayers run through the memoir. The author reiterates the fact that faith in God removes all obstacles in life. The conversational style of writing connects well with readers, making it easy for them to understand her journey. The author has also shared the poems she wrote during that phase in her life, where she again speaks about her story, faith in the Lord, and a Higher Power. For all those who are suffering from cancer and are battling the disease, this book is a must-read as it will give them hope, strength, and courage to fight the disease.


Book Review

A Time to Read: A Beautiful and Soulful Tale about Trust and Belief in the Lord!
By Author JB Richardson November 16, 2016
Format: Kindle Edition|Verified Purchase
5.0 out of 5.0 stars

Having herself experienced a lifetime of tragedy and joy, Author Brenda Mohammed assumes the mantle of theologian/philosopher in her quest to understand and explain the elegance and meaning found in the biblical verses extolled in Ecclesiastes 3.
In "Your TIME is NOW: A Time to be Born and a Time to Die", Mohammed fully examines each memorable and precious verse and applies them to her own life experiences.
In doing so, she takes the reader on a journey through a lifetime filled with trials and tribulations, despair and hope, loss and success. The author eloquently defines Ecclesiastes 3, pointing out that, by freely accepting God's will, she has been amply blessed with a faithful family, loyal mentors, good friends, and a full life.
She successfully leaves her readers with a message of hope and inspiration by sharing her belief that, through introspection and prayer, one may find meaning within the events of their own everyday experiences. She appears to be a firm proponent to the old adage, "When days seem at their darkest, surrendering and trusting in the divine will ensure peace and prosperity".
All in all, I found this book to be quite engaging. The author's reflections on her childhood were beyond charming in some spots, yet brought me to tears in others. Her candidness about her relationships with parents, siblings, husband, and her own children reminded me so much of my own family's saga, and I must admit that I was thrilled to find a read that tugged at my heartstrings the way this book did!
For any individual seeking solace and meaning in today's hectic world, "Your TIME is NOW: A Time to be Born and a Time to Die" is a beautiful and soulful read.
Thank you, Brenda Mohammed, for sharing your journey with me!



Book Review

AN INSPIRATION TO ALL
ByJosephine Calabrese on February 22, 2017
Format: Kindle Edition|Verified Purchase
5.0 out of 5.0 stars
Memoirs of Dr. Andrew Moonir Khan: Journey of an Educator by Brenda Mohammed

Reading of Dr. Andrew Moonir's youth, life as an educator and church leader, I have come to know this man as a decent man, individual of good character, and a man who thought, planned out, and in a step-by-step process persevered to achieve his goals. Great men aren't forgotten and all learn from such men.

If a documentary hasn't been done on Dr. Andrew Moonir Khan's Life, his life should be filmed in a documentary. He is an inspiration.

Josephine Calabrese
Writer, Lyricist, Publisher, and Teacher

AUTHOR’S BIOGRAPHY

Brenda Mohammed is an award –winning multi -genre writer and former Bank Manager who has written sixteen books to date.
She is an accomplished traveller.
Her travel experiences have translated into a captivating array of travel-inspired non-fiction books. A reviewer of one of her books on travel said,
While many people travel, few of us are capable of sharing our experience in a meaningful and relevant way with strangers. This author does a superb job.
Brenda is also a writer of fiction.
This excerpt from a review of one of her books from Readers Favorite confirms that she is very good at it.
Revenge of Zeeka, by Brenda Mohammed, is a one of a kind novella trilogy that delivers an incredible story guaranteed to give readers an absolute sci-fi treat.
I especially liked how Brenda used current events as the pivotal point from which to build this amazing sci-fi horror. This made the story even more relatable. More importantly, however, I admired how she owned her story and created this captivating version of events. She captured with an amazing depth the setting, characters, plot, and emotions in such few words.
Brenda won awards for her books from Metamorph's Publishing and Mc Grath House in 2016. She loves to interact with her readers and other authors.
Brenda lives in the beautiful Caribbean island of Trinidad and is a fan of photography and art.
She willingly donates books to children's hospitals, national libraries, and school libraries.
Feel free to connect with Brenda through Facebook and Twitter.


Buy the books at Amazon Universal Link