Let's Visit France Via Carole Roman's Cultural Tour!

\In 1828, Paris was the first city in Europe to use gas
lamps to light the streets, and that's how it got the
nickname "La Ville-Lumiere" the "City of Light."
~~~

 

If You Were Me and Lived in France:
A Child's Introduction to Cultures Around the World

By Carole P. Roman

Most who think of France will also think immediately of the Eiffel Tower! It must be a beautiful sight to be able to look over the city from the top! Wish we could!

As always, Ms. Roman wants us to meet some of the children who live in France... If you were a boy, your name could be

Hugo

Mathis

or...Theo!

If you are a girl, your name could be Clara

Jacqueline, or

Collette!

The other thing many of us hear about and sometimes get to try here in the U.S., are french pastries. These would be bought in a boulangerie where you might pick out some owl's bread along with so many options you'd not be able to decide!

or maybe you'd get to go to lunch for crepes! Crepes are delicate pancakes that can be filled with vegetables, meat,or cheese. Dessert crepes are made with fruit and dusted with sugar.

Some lucky girls get to start a collection of beautiful dolls!

but there are many dolls that she might play with that look like the children there...

Boys, here, also enjoy soccer, but make believe is always a good time... for girls and boys!

Just like July 4th is important to the U.S., July 14th is the celebration of Bastille Day!

Find out what this commemorates in the book as well!

The Catacombs

Palace of Versailles 

And while the children are playing or learning, I picked out a few places I'd like to visit! LOL

The Louvre

Arch de Triumph

Mont Saint Michel

And, of course, the French Riviera!

And I found this song I'd never heard before but loved it by, of course, one of the best-known French singers...

Isn't it wonderful to learn about a country in this way?!


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The Last Infection by Michael Garza May Become Addictive...Have you been Infected?

I think Zombies have been around forever and there are always fans, aren't there...but...once you've seen one zombie, or a group, is there more to be said about them? I didn't think so, until Michael Garza sent me his latest...

The Last Infection began as I expected...but before long I was become more and more interested. Why do we love to experience fear vicariously? And yet, Garza presents us with more than fear...

The main thing that Garza adds are the characters who are running for their lives. Even while they are running, their personal life issues do not disappear and that's what pulls readers in... The hope that there will be some to escape the terrible apocalyptic...

Last Infection

By Michael W. Garza

It had started out just like AIDS and other world-wide infections... sometimes passed on through used needles...not something that resulted in death for those who were infected... No, this became

worse... They didn't die, but they acquired the same taste as those
who died--the need for blood to keep them alive!

The infected were treated,  and others were placed in isolation, but no matter what, those who were helping them, even wearing masks didn't stop the spread..

But there was something different about those who had become infected, they were still in fairly decent shape and could move faster... If you watched their eyes, you saw some sign of life... and they could think... slowly, they began to evolve, adapt and communicate with each other... Worse, they had started to round up Zombies! What d they plan to do with them? 

It happened much faster than any other plague; people died as soon as it reached an area and cities were empty, vehicles abandoned. If anybody was still alive, you would see them at the top of hi-rise buildings, having used equipment to block off the lower floors...

The infected had an awful look about
them and they made unnatural
lurching motions with their
arms that scared the heck out of him.
 He hoped they would give up...
~~~

Most everybody was gone now...If you were still alive and uninfected, you were being hunted... Jake and Alicen had always fought alot, over nothing and anything... Jake was the only one to help Alicen stay alive... They were now on their own, their parents had lost their lives as they tried to escape... Jake was now all that kept them from dying as well...

The news had called the growing mobs, the infected. Alicen and Jake heard terrible things from school and their friends. Some called the infected, vampires, because they wanted blood. Others called them biters because they chewed through your skin. Jake didn't know what to think. He only wished that he hadn't heard all the stories that were stuck in his head. "Don't let them get me," Alicen whispered. 
"I want mama," Alicen said. "Hold on ," Jake said. "I told you we have to hide first." He spoke so low, he had to move his lips against her ears before she could hear him. "Please stay quiet." There was nothing in Jake's twelve years that prepared him for what was happening. He'd spent the last few weeks terrified, held up in his family home as his parent's tried to figure out what to do. The man on the news promised that they'd find a cure and this would all be over soon. That was three weeks ago. A few days later, the news and every other channel went black. 

~~~

He swore under his breath. He'd let down his guard and fell asleep in what was a sporting goods store before the infection. The mistake left him trapped with only one way out into the rest of the mall. The quad outside the entryway was crawling with a group of infected. He'd counted two dozen, but more were coming. Their quick twitching movements identified their infliction at once.
                                                 ~~~

Chris becomes the lead character in the story. But no way did he want the role. He had made it through a major detox on his own and now he wanted to live and that required him being on his own...He had been living on his own, and able to stay alive, but he was being pulled in to help with the children--by a woman who just would not accept "no..." 

A gunshot was easy to recognize and these days, someone had to be in real trouble to waste the round. Chris froze and waited for the echo to clear. He closed his eyes and turned in the direction of a new sound. His eyes sprang open and he ran towards the side of the building. The sound of voices, now screaming, guiding him and as he neared the front of the building, he made them out. “Get behind me,” a distinctively feminine voice cried. There was another gunshot as Chris reached the corner of the building. “Here they come, get ready.” Chris peeked out onto a parking lot in front of the store and found the woman behind the voice almost immediately . She raised a handgun and fired...
                                                                         ~~~

He had seen the two kids before but they had turned away from him. Now some woman was trying to protect them! The feeling of guilt swirled inside of Chris, eating away at him until he called out, “Come on,” Chris yelled. “Follow me.” From then on, whether he wanted it or not, Chris was the leader...working to get them all to safety. Where would that be? Well, Jake knew of an island... Catalina...

They had barely started on their way when they came up against a barricade...and were facing a different type of danger. A group of survivalist had so far been lucky. They had been living far in the woods and had not been infected. But now they were trying to keep it that way and they captured anybody who was not now ill. They quickly separated Chris and Jake and took the two females...they would become wives for two of the most loyal members!

But did they really think they would be free of those out there hunting...for blood?! Soon, the infected were coming and, much slower, zombies were following!

 At times through their journey, Chris' small group was able to join with others and, on the way, Jenn wanted to try to find her mother and father... Living and escape items, food, bandages, water...and gas for the latest confiscated  vehicle each brought a fight...with somebody... and, always, the zombies were coming up from behind...

And when they had made it to the building where Jenn's parents were supposed to be and climbed to the top floors, as hostages of those inside, they were already surrounded and the infected soon were working to get into the building... while Jenn, who had found only her father alive, Chris, Jake, and Alicen, joined with a few others, were moving on via a different route...

But would anybody really escape?

You know who you are, don't you... Zombie enthusiasts are bound to get extra thrills as new combatants join the war against the few humans still not infected... Will any escape? Or is it really the final ending of the world? 

Michael Garza has gone well beyond the pure chase scenes in most zombie fiascos...If you enjoy bloody gore and freaky dead humans...do check out The Last Infection. While it's not my kind of thing, I believe Garza has done much to add depth, diverse, and character issues into the zombie savagery... What more could you want? LOL



GABixlerReviews

Michael W. Garza often finds himself wondering where his inspiration will come from next and in what form his imagination will bring it to life. The outcomes regularly surprise him and it's always his ambition to amaze those curious enough to follow him and take in those results. He encourages readers to peek at his latest work as well as the material he's published in the past. He sincerely hopes that everyone will find something that astonishes, surprises, or simply scares the heck out of you.

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Mind's Eye By Douglas E. Richards Exhilarating Look at Future in Scifi Thriller

Or was he insane already? No.
It couldn’t be. He felt totally rational.
And totally sane. He laughed out loud.
 Sure, he thought. I’m as sane and rational
as any other guy without a memory
 who wakes up in a dumpster and
 hears voices in his head.
~~

The stench was so utterly horrid that it seemed to be attacking him. It was the putrid stink of rot and of food gone bad. It was an unholy soup of dozens of odors that each would have been bad enough alone, but which seemed to clash in revolting and impossible ways when forced together. Panic squeezed his heart to near bursting as he realized he was drowning in this noxious cloud. He fought desperately to take a breath, but this act was somehow impossible. It was as though he had forgotten how, as if the mental wiring that triggered his breathing response had been neatly snipped. His burning lungs screamed at him for air, and he knew he had but seconds to live. 
Suddenly, from the depths of his panic, an epiphany burst forth. He wasn’t drowning. Instead, he was in the middle of a terrible nightmare, and his breathing reflex was only failing in the vivid dream world his mind had constructed. His physical body was asleep and paralyzed. He threw all of his will into tearing off the crushingly heavy cloak of unconsciousness,  and an instant later his full mind exploded to the surface, like a swimmer held down too long in the depths of a cold and murky ocean, and escaping just in time. Now fully conscious, albeit groggy, he felt the weight of eyelids that were shuttering his vision. He heard whispers in his mind; dozens of them. He could catch words and phrases; images. A kaleidoscope of activity just below the surface, blending together into a white noise; incessant chatter from hundreds of non-stop talkers all speaking at once. He shook his head to try to stop the maddening whispers in his mind, but without success. He anxiously opened his eyes. And was greeted by an absolute, impenetrable darkness...

~~

Mind's Eye

By Douglas E. Richards

Many science fiction novels are based upon actual research which has been explored. While recognizing that a writer puts the emotional fear and thriller components, I just had to see if and how long this research to implant control units in the brain  has been underway... And it's much longer than I imagined! Now I'm wondering just how far the potential has advanced...

The potential to use and control the Internet with your mind! I've been a Trekkie from the beginning, watching Star Trek and imagining living in a time when you could tell a machine to fix your next cup of tea...LOL... Now that I'm older, though, I am much more cautious about what the future may hold due to scientific experimentation...

It's bad enough when you awake in the darkness of a garbage dumpster and look around in fear trying to figure out where you are and what's happened...

But when you get out and find you are being hunted by "real people" with real guns, you've got to go into hyper-drive wondering, What the...???

Shit! he thought, almost hysterically.
He was dead! Hall clutched at the small 
sink for support,
reeling. He had killed a man. 
Hall didn’t remember who he was,
but he was certain he had never killed
 before. Bile rose in his throat as he
 pondered taking a life. Even though the
 man had been intent on taking his, Hall
suspected he would have puked if his
 stomach wasn’t totally empty.
~~~

Fortunately Hall was intelligent. Even though he had lost his memory and gained other abilities, he was able to quickly assimilate and pull together information into conceptual ideas. It didn't take any major skills, however, for him to realize that he could read the minds of people around him. No, in wasn't cool! He was quickly immersed in dozens of different conversations from all the people around him, hearing every words.. and, worse, learning that people really weren't very nice, even when they didn't realize another individual knew what they were thinking!
But he at least had learned that he was a Marine Biologist...

The man continued approaching, with practiced quiet. Hall’s five senses couldn’t have possibly detected that he was outside and approaching, let alone his precise position, but the sixth sense Hall now possessed could see from his attacker’s eyes, so he could judge with uncanny accuracy when to launch his attack. 

He whipped open the door with all of the speed and strength at his command, just as the man in his mind’s eye began to raise his gun, and was rewarded when the door handle slammed into the man’s outstretched hand, sending his gun flying. The assassin stifled a scream, and reflexively brought his now bloodied paw to eye level to assess the damage, discovering that at least two of his fingers were now broken.
Hall dived for the man’s gun, having no time to ponder this verification that his ESP was real, after all, and highly accurate.                                                                                     ~~~

It was unnerving to be eavesdropping on somebody's telephone call or conversations in order to discover what his probable name was and that somebody wanted him dead! He learned that it was Frank Bardino, a mob hit man, who was trying to kill him and right now he was fuming because Hall obviously had training and skills that had allowed him to capture him... And that he was supposed to be an easy science target. This guy certainly had a lot more going for him than he had been told! 

He had earlier identified the place on his head where it appeared he had been hurt. Now he was ascertaining that some type of implant had been placed in his brain which allowed him to think what he wanted to know and quickly be connected to the Internet...but was that the reason for the ESP he also had--and why had he lost all of his personal memory?

Nevertheless, he definitely knew one thing. He had to keep running... and it was at the next place--some type of office rental space building, that he busted into what he thought was an empty office. But she was there... And he couldn't read her with his ESP!

I liked Megan Emerson, the character Hall hooks up with, saving her life and killing two more men... I wondered whether her creative mind was part of the reason he could not read her thoughts... But, they did discover that they could talk telepathically which added a very cool dimension to the story! And, of course, along the way, they started to feel a personal connection...

Soon, not only the original guys who had been sent to kill him, but the federal government was after the couple. Word of his abilities--Hall had originally written an email and sent it to both the government and newspapers, but had not remembered doing it--was out. For the good or bad results! And there is no way for readers to know which, so we keep reading just to keep up with what exciting things are happening! 

Finally, Hall was able to piece things together from the Internet, locate where he had been and make contact with a representative of the company which had originally been doing the research--at least as much as they knew of the overall project!

High tension, cool futuristic possibilities along with unbridled fear of what could happen with so much control by one individual... Well you get the picture! This SciFi hypothesis is one of the best I've read and certainly worth your further exploration... But stay away from those who implant!!! LOL...


GABixlerReviews

Douglas E. Richards has been widely praised for his ability to weave action, suspense, and science into riveting novels that straddle the thriller and science fiction genres. He is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of WIRED, AMPED, THE CURE, MIND'S EYE, and QUANTUM LENS (October 1, 2014). He has also written six middle grade/young adult novels widely acclaimed for their appeal to boys, girls, and adults alike.

A former biotech executive, Richards earned a BS in microbiology from the Ohio State University, a master's degree in genetic engineering from the University of Wisconsin (where he engineered mutant viruses now named after him), and an MBA from the University of Chicago. In recognition of his work, Richards was selected to be a "special guest" at San Diego Comic-Con International, along with such icons as Stan Lee and Ray Bradbury. He has written numerous feature articles for the award-winning magazine, National Geographic KIDS--some having appeared in a dozen languages in as many as sixteen countries--as well as essays for the BBC, The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Earth & Sky, Today's Parent, and many others.

The author currently lives in San Diego, California, with his wife, two children, and two dogs. Please feel free to friend him on Facebook at Douglas E. Richards Author, or write to him at doug@san.rr.com