by Alan Black
By Michael Rittermeyer
Metal Boxes by Alan Black
Thoroughly entertaining - Found I actually lost track of time when I was reading. Has been awhile since a book has taken me there.
By Mike Proffitt
Loved it - I have not read many Sci.Fi books. I finished the author's other book "Chasing Harpo" and I was so thoroughly entertained by it so much so I had a hard time putting it down. So for this one I was a little skeptical that I could follow along but boy was I wrong. The author has a exceptional way of bringing all the characters to life with a believability so you are able to relate to them. When a author can put you into the storyline like that you know it is gonna be a great ride with all the twists and turns and ups and downs. It is clever, funny and engages you. I definitely look forward to this author’s next book whatever it is!!!!!
By Tammie
Great Book! - Great read. The flow of the book was well thought out and engaging. At times it was like I was there watching it all through Stone’s eyes. Very good read. Would like to see more stories on this character in future books. They’d be worth the read as I couldn’t put this eBook away!
By Brian A.
A fun evening - Highly enjoyable military juvenile coming of age SF. A little gem in the genre and a great night off from heavy reading, recommended as fun, adventurous and leaving you with the pleasant glow of finishing a Flash Gordon arc.
an extended combat of attrition and its culture a little light but again within the sub genre all of this is to be expected.
I would read another in the same setting happily.
By Robert Casey
The Friendship Stones by Alan Black
Growing up in the Ozarks in the 1920s
An engrossing coming of age story set in the Ozark Mountains right after World War I. The heroine, 12-year-old LillieBeth Hazkit, lives with her parents in a two-room rented cabin. Work is scarce in the mountains, and her father, who was gassed in World War I, has to take a job far away at a charcoal burning company and is able to come home only on the weekend. The work does (not help) his damaged lungs
LillieBeth cheerfully does a round of chores that would make a grown man blanch today. She also “harvests” small game for dinner with the family’s 22 rifle. She can go to school in a one-room schoolhouse only once a week because it’s so far from home. She brings the rest of the week’s work home to do there. With her cozy home and her parents she feels rich. After all, doesn’t she have two dresses, one for work and one for Sunday?
From a Sunday sermon she learns that God wants everybody to love all people, even the unlovable ones, so she sets out to befriend an old recluse, Fletcher Hoffman, a man who rode with Quantrill’s Raiders the Civil War and did his share of killing afterwards. He just wants to be left alone.
The story revolves around LillieBeth’s attempts to befriend Hoffman and the (violent) actions of a pair of louts who attack LillieBeth and have enjoyed raping women in the neighborhood for years, destroying their lives and any possibility they could marry. It’s the women’s word against theirs. They always say the women wanted it.
In addition, LillieBeth’s landlady orders them to leave their (rented) cabin so that her son, his wife and his family will have a place to live. This will leave the Hazkit family homeless, and LillieBeth will be forced to leave the only home she has ever known.
LillieBeth’s emotions are becoming more complex as she grows into womanhood. She is confused by her conflicting emotions, wanting to do the right thing—to follow Bible’s injunction to love her neighbors, but she finds it hard to love the men who attacked her and the landlord who is evicting her family.
Black gives us a vivid description of life in the Ozark Mountains in the 1920s. He also gives us believable characters which we can love or hate as the story requires.
Highly recommended. And when you finish reading it, give it to your 12-year-old daughter to read.
By Marilynn Larew (author of ‘The Spider Catchers’)
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