Preface

It’s been a little over three years since my last Book Reviews And Comments By Rick O was published. Well get ready, because Volume three is out. It features one hundred forty eight reviews, two Rambling Comments, one promotion, a short story by Rick O (I Remember? A Short Story) and one Christmas remembrance (Memory of a Bygone Christmas) by review contributor Pat Koelmel. I had a lot of fun doing these reviews and enjoyed the numerous emails the authors sent me after seeing my review of their book. Almost all of the writers agreed with my comments with a few exceptions. I pointed out their strengths, weaknesses, and tried to compare their book with another writer’s similar book. Kind of like The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of literature (I didn’t find anything ugly). I would like to thank contributors Deron O, Kai O and Pat Koelmel for their energetic guest reviews. In my previous review book, I listed the top ten books that I read during that time period. Well, let’s do this time period (8/27/2015 to 9/10/2018), but this time I’ll also include the first line of my review of the their books:

Number one- Jamaica Inn by Daphne Du Maurier. Sometimes I wonder why I’m wasting my time reading contemporary novelists when I can read classic authors such as Daphne Du Maurier (1907-1989), who wrote this 1936 romantic suspense novel.

Number two- Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. “Shiver me timbers”, this novel was a treasure.

Number three-The Virginian by Owen Wister. Is this 1902 story by Owen Wister the blueprint cowboy (the author designates them as cow-boys or cow-punchers) novel for thousands of novels and movies yet to come?

Number four- God’s Little Acre by Erskine Caldwell. Erskine Caldwell’s 1933 novel God’s little Acre is Southern Gothic at its best.

Number five- The Girl Before by JP Delaney. This is the best psychogenic thriller I’ve read in a long time.

Number six- A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith. Betty Smith’s entertaining 1943 novel is reminiscent of Charles Dickens’ novels of the mid 1800s.

Number seven- A Gentleman in Moscow. What a wonderful novel. What marvelous prose.

Number eight-The Woman in the Window by A. J. Finn. The author, A. J. Finn, has weaved a Alfred Hitchcockian type tale that reminds me of the 1954 movie, Rear Window.

Number nine- The Fireman by Joe Hill. This novel was literally on fire for 747 pages.

Number ten- Everybody Behaves Badly by Lesley M. M. Blume. Mon Dieu, Lesley M. M. Blume has written more than an historical novel revolving around Ernest Hemingway’s writing of The Sun Also Rises (1926).

The front cover photo is Rick O at his favorite vacation spot, Waikiki beach, Hawaii. Photo taken by Derek O. The back cover is Rick O and his grandchildren, Kalena O, Kaleo O and Kai O at Masa Sushi Restaurant in NJ. Photo was also taken by Derek O.