Hello everyone! Welcome to another post of Indie Recommends Indie! Today, I have author Boshra Rasti on the series! You may remember her from the gendered genres Creator’s Roulette feature. 🙂 Let’s get started!
Boshra, thank you for joining me for this series! Please tell me and my readers a bit about yourself.
When I write, it’s tunnel vision. It’s as if I am literally omniscient and I’m just channelling whatever it is that is meant to be. I guess that’s what keeps writers writing, it’s the closest thing to feeling like God without being on drugs.
Although I don’t resonate with pigeon holing, labelling for the sake of labelling, I’m going to do it anyway or else you’ll have no idea about how to classify me. I am Iranian Canadian, whatever that means, and Surrogate Colony is my debut novel. I am a teacher as well, having taught all grades from 1 – 12. When I am not obliged to work, I write. It’s my drug of choice.
Do you primarily read indie books or big publishers books as well?
I primarily read anything I can get my hands on. I am getting more and more addicted to indie though, just because it is more unique, totes the line a bit more.
Boshra’s Indie Recommendations
What Feeds the Heart by Daryl Glinn-Tanner
Genre: Memoir
Published: 2021
While sitting at her mother’s deathbed, Jean Marie Stark reflects on her childhood spent inside a hippie commune in the mountains above Los Angeles. Neglected by her mother amidst the revelry of the commune’s “Summer of Love” parties, young Jean searches for food as she yearns for denied maternal love. Jean creates solace in Willothin—a concoction of her whimsical imagination—with her new friend by her side; Jean finds beauty amongst the chaos. This coming-of-age account chronicles the struggles and triumphs of a young girl through past and present, reality versus imagination, grief, and acceptance as she digests what it means to feed the heart.
Eloquently written, with complex characters and an achingly-real depiction of the main character. Jean, a young child, grows up among neglectful, abusive adults and an emotionally and psychologically absent mother.
What Feeds the Heart was an engrossing tale of the trauma that results from drug and alcohol addicted parents.
The voice is first person and is told from a little girls perspective. Frequent conversations with an imaginary friend, Willothen, make the novel animated and help the reader portray a character who is resilient because of her imagination.
There are heart-wrenching flash forwards to a hospital room, where as an adult the main character speaks with her dying mother in the hospital room where she lays. This gives us the perspective and character arc of transformation despite years of neglect and abuse. Although it was a heart-wrenching read, I believe this is a must read.
I would recommend this to anyone who wants answers about life and suffering. In this novel, the main character suffers a lot at the hands of a drug-addicted mother, but in the end benevolence overcomes anger and years of neglect. I loved how the novel/memoir ended, on a high note. A flashback to a resolution, but not in the Hollywood sense of a resolution.
Anything but Brave: A Diary into Addiction by Lesandra Simpson
Memoir
Published: 2017
A coming-of-age account of a girl’s descent into crystal meth addiction. The story, told in first person, details the battle within her, followed by an epilogue of her road to recovery.
A memoir that incorporates 6 years of drug addiction and the road to redemption. The memoir starts in 1999 when she is a teenager, and concluding after 2005. I loved the diary format and the first person point of view that shows the author spiralling down a rabbit hole of addition and self-neglect. This is apparent to the reader, but the first person point of view shows that the author isn’t aware of what’s going on. This is a powerful example of the denial that takes part when abusing alcohol, drugs and sex. It shows the author go through multiple burst of short-term employment followed by crashes into the abyss of drug abuse. The memoir is a testament to how salvation is possible, even when addicted to the most harsh drugs created by man. Her hope is reestablished through acknowledgement and personal work. I love that in the sadness there is hope.
Anything but Brave is an engaging memoir and the voice is one of the perfect storm that we can create for ourselves with a bit of denial and enabling relationships with ourselves and others. The readers quickly comes to feel for the main character and watch her rawness and realness and struggles through addiction. The poetic rhythm and literary quality of some of the passages shows how the human spirit is alive and well, even in the depths of despair.
I would recommend this book unreservedly to those who are interested in surviving the turmoil of addiction and suffering.
Bloodmark by J.P. Mclean
Fantasy
Published: 2021
What if your lifelong curse is the only thing keeping you alive? Abandoned at birth, life has always been a battle for Jane Walker. She and her best friend, Sadie, spent years fighting to survive Vancouver’s cutthroat underbelly. That would have been tough enough without Jane’s mysterious afflictions: an intricate pattern of blood-red birthmarks that snake around her body and vivid, heart-wrenching nightmares that feel so real she wakes up screaming.
After she meets the first man who isn’t repulsed by her birthmarks, Jane thinks she might finally have a chance at happiness. Her belief seems confirmed as the birthmarks she’s spent her life so ashamed of magically begin to disappear. Yet, the quicker her scarlet marks vanish, the more lucid and disturbing Jane’s nightmares become—until it’s impossible to discern her dreams from reality, and Jane comes to a horrifying realization:
The nightmares that have plagued her since childhood are actually visions of real people being stalked by a deadly killer. And all this time, her birthmarks have been the only things protecting her from becoming his next victim.
Blood Mark is the first in a brand-new paranormal thriller series by JP McLean, author of The Gift Legacy series and whose writing has been described as “. . . deftly crafted, impressively original, and inherently compelling from first page to last.”
JP McLean says she writes addiction fiction and I found this to be true in Bloodmark. The third-person narration is distant enough for the breadth of characters she uses to tell the story, but is also close enough to understand the main character, her roommate and the motivations of the villain. I liked how a city that is close to my heart was used as the setting, Vancouver. I can see she’s done a lot of research into the scene that is Vancouver. She does a great job of showing the down-sides of Vancouver as well, high price of rent, disenfranchised young women and the undercurrent of crime that bring money to it as well.
I liked the breadth of the characters and how the plot lines came together, really tantalized me.
I would recommend this read to those that like fantasy with an urban twist.
Buildings Without Murders by Dan Gutstein
Science Fiction, Literary Fiction
Published 2020
When the Civil Illumination Authority of an overbuilt American city solicits bids for a lucrative contract, the ensuing competitive efforts of one multinational corporation eventually unleash a morbid act of violence—one that affects a number of lives orbiting each other, including feisty redhead, LaRousse.
A young woman who charges ahead, provokes, and yields to tenderness, LaRousse negotiates the intellectual and physical spaces between her stormy father, Wiry Strength, her activist romantic partner, Vermont Values, and her dopey street-kid chums, Docile and Pockets.
The world of Buildings Without Murders subscribes, in part, to James Lovelock’s “Gaia hypothesis,” in that the earth is a living organism, and is trying to decipher how it might repair itself. Phenomena abound, including the ghost rockets, GPS pins, jazz holograms, and loose lightning.
En route to turning eighteen, LaRousse encounters the beguiling phenomenon of the God Booth Project, and her trips to this novelty attraction reverse a lifelong assumption in life-changing fashion.
This is a solid book in terms of literary style. There is a definite sense of foreboding from the beginning of the novel. The uniqueness of the main character is also apparent not only in what she looks like, but also how she views the world. The main character’s arc is fascinating and transformative. When LaRousee, the main character of the novel discovers the God Booth, she goes through a transformation that shapes the story in way that are hair-raising. I love the fact that the main character is a strong, adolescent, female character. The impact that this novel had on my thoughts and feelings about science fiction as a genre is what really resonates with my soul.
Anyone interested in fascinating characters, powerful, literary sentences and quirky, unique novels.
Road to Redemption by Crystal Kirkham
Published 2016
Genre: Paranormal
Saints & Sinners #1
Centuries ago Michel made a deal with the devil and now, for longer than he cares to think about, he’s only just managed to stay one step ahead of the death and destruction cursed to follow him for eternity. Now his wanderings have brought him to the strange city of La Port and a girl who knows a thing or two about the supernatural. Paige is determined to rid Michel of his curse and free him from Satan’s grasp. When Satan discovers her involvement in his affairs, Michel must tread the depths of hell itself to save her and maybe save himself as well.
I love stories where the main characters are flawed by learn to develop from their flaws. This is the case with this story, at times the characters become hopelessly lost, but learn to salvage their humanity by the end of the book.
The main intrigue was the heaven and hell dichotomy, that age old juxtaposition that keeps people guessing and philosophizing about what the characters will do and how it will not only impact them personally, but the larger picture. I love books that are at times preachy, but that are well-rounded enough to know they are too.
For me the most interesting aspect was the setting of hell, which was unique and thoroughly described. I live fire and brimstone, the demons that needed to be fought. It was an intriguing setting and one that was well-written and creative.
Anyone interested in paranormal, urban legend type stories.
Boshra’s Book Spotlight
Surrogate Colony
Science Fiction: Dystopian
Published 2021
In MicroScrep, a post-pandemic world, one politician, Arthur Mills, brings all scientists and engineers together to create a vaccine and rebuild a world where harmony ensues. What results is a society where algorithms control who you marry, who your child is, and what position you have.
Adriana Buckowski is not normal. Her eyes are two different colors, making her less susceptible to the system’s propaganda, she has a unique connection with a boy named Zach, and she has questions. Weird occurrences happen as she gets closer to her Calling Ceremony, where she’ll be given a position. When she finally starts piecing together the twisted motives at play in MicroScrep, she becomes a cog in the wheel of the state. Her only option for survival lies with Zach, and the hope that she will be vindicated through a vigilante group off-grid.
Find this book on Goodreads, Indie Story Geek and Amazon. Read an excerpt here.
Readers who enjoyed A Brave New World and A Handmaid’s Tale will love this story.
Connect with Boshra on Goodreads, Twitter and Instagram or check out her website for updates.
Did you add any books to your TBR today based on this post or did you see any you have already read? Tell us in the comments!
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Banner Photo of library by Alfons Morales on Unsplash
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