Enjoyable, good story. Needs some polishing, but worth a read...
579989
Let's Kidnap the President is an entertaining read featuring the self-discovery and self-actualization of four monkeys from the jungles of India. Monkeys typically live to meet their basic needs, but these four soon become dissatisfied with their lot, and the Boss has noticed, making things very difficult for them.

They finally decide to leave their group and end up in a village, where they begin to want more for themselves, though initially their goals are limited to returning to their group and overthrowing the Boss. From that point, the story follows them through self-awareness, self-identity and personal growth, and eventually, their desire for riches and renown, which ultimately leads to the quest that names this book.

The growth of the monkeys into individuals is well portrayed and entertaining. Their quest is humorous and yet sprinkled with the psychology and science at the heart of their progression. Maslow's hierarchy is used, as are philosophies from Indian culture. The four make mistakes, learn from them, and discover that they are more and can be more than they'd ever imagined. Occasional shifts to humans trying to figure out these four strange monkeys add to the entertainment value.

Overall, this book is smart, well-thought, and well-researched. However, the language use is rough, and the book needs some serious editing. The good side is that would only be for grammar and usage, not content, plot, etc. Despite the grammar, I enjoyed this story. There are some beautiful passages, often insightful and sometimes even musical. I hope that one day this gem can be polished.

I would recommend this lighthearted, though insightful, story to those who enjoy allegory and humor and who don't mind some rough edges.

I found this story while it was on a free promotion on Amazon, but I can't remember exactly when. This one's been on my kindle for a long time, perhaps a couple of years. Anyway, I'm glad I picked it up.
4285737
Great book!  Wonderful story!  Needs better editing.
971631
This is an engaging story that needs a proofreader to fix the spotty grammatical errors and misspellings. The errors are just frequent enough to bring this book from four stars to three.

As far as the story goes, I liked it. The term of demon though, was less than imaginative. The growing powers of Analia intrigue me. There's got to be more of a connection with the life/power of plants than is either explained or developed.

The book hints at a relationship between Sonya and Ethanule and an as yet to be developed relationship between Calic and a human woman on Earth (either that, or he gets his mate back). It's evident that Maric will be paired up with Nadia on the icy planet. I liked the book enough that I am tempted to buy the sequel, but the first chapters in the sequel (at the end of this book) don't bode well for a smart heroine.
4417427
I loved the story. It was a real page turner from the beginning. Mystery, action, heat...it was all there. There were a couple of things that I did not care for. One is this story desperately needs an editor.  Misspelled words, missing words, extra words, the wrong tense used.  That is something that highly frustrates me.  The other thing that made me grate my teeth is the use of the words: "crotch" and "lady bits" when referring to a woman's sex.  that just almost ruined the moment for me.  This might sound rather petty, and for most, it might not bother them at all, but it just drove me crazy.  I would recommend this book. Definite great read, just ready yourself for the grammatical errors.
3924188
Decent story, fairly well edited. Enjoyable read
3763678
I enjoyed the story and the characters. I felt there was a lot of detailed information, indicating the author did due diligence in researching technical topics. I did find the book riddled with spelling and grammatical errors, and this was a bit irritating. I think it needs some editing and cleaning up to really polish it into a great book.
1638312
This is a very good epic-style story. I enjoyed the characters. Sometimes things were a bit too pat, but that isn't unusual in today's stories. The reason for the less than glowing rating is the editing, or lack of editing. Mister Ploof, get an editor, a good editor. You have talent and it's not going where it could with this lazy writing. Poor editing interrupts the flow of a book, and that ruins the enjoyment. Take it seriously and give it the priority it deserves. However, as I said, this is a good story with good characters. With good editing, I can see you improving and your success growing accordingly.
3248806
As other reviewers have already addressed the editing issues, which I have to say didn't bother me as much as it did some readers, I will not say much about it other then...yes, editing would have been much appreciated. I will say that I was still able to enjoy the story itself. It's a debut novel so I give a bit of leeway to the author and will be reading the next book in the series hoping that the author takes the reviews to heart and understand that the better the book (this includes editing), the better the reviews, the more sales she will garner. I see much potential and I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

The positives: It's a lighter biker book compared to some out there and that's what I was in the mood for at the time. I liked how it showed multiple sides of the characters and that major issues took time to resolve. It just made it more believable to me.  I liked Raine from the start and Diego wasn't far behind. The background characters worked really well for the storyline. i loved the scene between Raine and Prosper the first time in the clubhouse.

The negatives: Needed a bit more dialog between main characters. A bit smoother transition between chapters would have helped the flow of the story. The last thing I'll bring up is the repeating of a past event.....a couple of times is okay but more then that is over-kill and wasn't needed in my opinion.

Overall I liked the book and would recommend it with the stipulation that potential readers be forewarned about the editing issues.
4684400
3.5 stars.  This book was an enjoyable read.  I found myself sometimes wandering but overall, good story.  The mystery was not a hard one to solve.  Not a mind blowing debut for a new writer (Check out my Meredith Duran Review), but I do want to read more about the firefighters of Sugarland, and will pick up more books by Jo Davis.  The difference with this author and an auto-buy author is in the way a story is told.  An auto-buy author that SHOWS you the story, Jo Davis told it.  Not all writers can achieve that, I know.  The writing didn't flow smoothly in the beginning, but I felt it improve towards the end of the book.  This book has 1. a very tortured hero Howard (Loved that name, and I really liked him) and 2. love scenes that may make you blush **sizzle**.  Zack's story comes out in May 2009.  Zack hasn't done the deed yet, so it will be a great story to read.
2048139
Update to my original review - I received an updated version of the book, which has been edited to correct the issues I mentioned previously.  While I did not re-read the entire book, I did re-read a good portion and am happy to say that the story flows much better and anyone reading the updated copy (which is the version currenly on Amazon), should enjoy the story without the distractions!  Well done!

+++++++++++++++Original review below:

The story centers around several ordinarily good people who commit unspeakable acts of violence and have no memory of those acts.

The story kept me interested until the end.  The idea was original and had a lot of promise.  However, it lacked depth both in the characters and in the story itself.  I wanted a main character to pull for while reading, but no one character has a larger role than any other.

While there are several editing / gramatical mistakes throughout the book, if you can not focus on those and read what the writer intended instead of what is written, I believe you will find the book worth reading.

Putting aside the need of a good proofreader, this writer has much potential.  I would try another of his books before deciding to move on.  Thank you for the opportunity to review this book; I received a complimentary copy of the book for reveiw.
4110119
The story was enjoyable sometimes.  Some of the plot devices were a little overdone.  It certainly needed a good profreading, not to mention editing--a lot of misused words and "apostrophe's" almost killed it for me.  Self-published authors don't have editors; I get that.  However there are plenty of style and usage guides out there.  This author has a lot of potential as a stortyteller and would really benefit from some nuts-and-bolts work on her craft.
4411320
4 STARS

Reviewed by Traci Hyland for Kindle Friends Forever

I am giving this review 4 stars because Amazon and Goodreads doesn't allow half stars, otherwise Id be giving it a 3.5. Though it is a good story and doesn't deserve a 3, it needs some work for me to truly feel it is a 4 star.

This is the story of a young single mother of 2 boys, who loves her boys to pieces but needs some me time, so she booked a holiday at a nice hotel to just rest, relax and enjoy herself.  Isobel is British and she is on holiday in England, near her home, where she meets Marc, a very attractive Harvard professor, who takes an instant liking to Isobel, who is a beautiful but plus sized woman.  It was refreshing to have a lead female that wasn't a whiny twit, and wasn't pencil thin with big boobs all up in her face.  She was beautiful and still a bigger woman.

For me, the fact that she was British and he was American was a key factor because I couldn't get past the fact that the way it was written. Isobel sounded more the American and Marc more the Brit. This may not have been noticeable to others, but it was absolutely noticeable to me. The story was also written very formally which took away from it for me. That isn't how people speak naturally, so it sounded very forced. Other than those two issues, I found it to be a light, sweet very appealing story and I'm looking forward to book two to see how the rest plays out. I enjoyed both characters and how they were together, and how they found each other and fell so quickly. It flowed well. It wasn't silly, ridiculous or drawn out. It still gave you a complete story and not a jump from one to the next and not really filling in the middle. And as always, the evil witch was just that, an evil witch and that was what it needed to be.

I would definitely recommend this story but I do think it needs to be less formal.
1262927
This was a fun story, but could have used a little polishing in the conversations.  The characters were very different from each other and that really made each shine in their own way.
2542605
I liked this story line. Although it dragged on a bit, the message was sweet and the push/pull between the characters kept me interested and entertained. What I didn't like, however; was the editing, or rather the lack thereof. There were far too many gramatical errors and spelling mistakes that were difficult to ignore. I would have given this book a higher rating if it had been edited.
2811466
This is a decent novella with an excellent story. Honestly, this could be developed into more. However, it's a flawed gem. By the time I reached the second page, I found errors that should have been caught in editing (e.g. "...giants. While...," has no space between the period and the first letter of the next sentence). This isn't a huge deal, and somewhat commonplace in self-publishing, but the work contains quite a few of these editor-misses.

The narrator voice fluctuates between casual and near-high-fantasy; the characters sometimes behave inconsistently; the major twist was needlessly telegraphed some chapters earlier; some characters are unceremoniously removed from the story after making a big deal out of them earlier.

Also, and this is my personal preference, but the novel also contains some worn out tropes that have been used time and again. For example, the beginning of the books tromps out the worn dwarves-are-great-smiths trope that doesn't serve the story.

But, like I said, I enjoyed the story and the premise. I think everything that bothered me could be fixed, the story expanded and this could graduate into an excellent full-blown novel.
970978
While I liked the plot and characters, the book needed a good editor. It is clear that this is the author's first novel as there are many places with needless descriptions of mundane activities. A good editor could have cut a quarter to a third of the book without losing any vital elements, making the book flow at a better pace. The book also needs a proofreader, but that is unfortunately too common with e-books these days. All that said, it is an enjoyable story with some interesting characters. And it shows promise for a new author.
4222810
Great idea, good flow... needs editing to correct typos and word choice (stalky vs. stocky, for example). I do think there are some continuity issues. Mostly, it seems like a great draft. Just needs some clean-up.

I LOVE the story-line, so far. I don't typically continue reading books that have editing issues, but this story is strong enough to keep me engaged. I am looking forward to the next book.