My Paranormal Book Review: Release Blast: Flame by Alicia Michaels

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Title: Flame
Series: The Bionics # 5
Author: Alicia Michaels
Audience: New Adult
Genre: Dystopian/Sci-Fi/Romance
Formats: E-book and Paperback
Publisher: Crimson Tree Publishing
Cover by: Strong Image Editing
Editor: Cynthia Shepp Editing and Review
Pages: 109 pages
Publishing Date: June 27, 2014

War has come to the United States. It’s been brewing for years as the government and Military Police wage war on the outcasts known as the Bionics. It’s spilling out into the streets as the militant Rejects continue to wage war against the ‘inferior’ humans, the M.P.s are raiding neighborhoods and putting Bionics to death, and I am fighting alongside the Resistance to save our kind from extinction. To top it all off, the president has now declared martial law, and the rights of American citizens are being stripped away one by one. Together, with the vigilante known as The Patriot, and my Resistance family, I am prepared to fight the impossible fight, to stand up for what’s right. From a single spark, our little rebellion has grown into a revolution, a roaring fire that will envelop the nation. At the same time, things in my personal life are finally turning around. I’m in love with a beautiful girl who loves me back, and we might have a shot at a real future … unless the enemy manages to snatch away from me everything that I hold dear.

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A weapon’s muzzle suddenly comes up to the back of my head and I freeze, lifting my hands and the CBX with it. An M.P. in white, fiberglass armor circles around me, the gun now focused on my forehead. I can see just by looking that he has it on the kill setting. “Look, man,” I say calmly. “I’m not one of them. I’m on your side here.” He raises the face shield of his helmet, and I’m face to face with a fresh recruit. He can’t be any older than eighteen and skinny as a rail, shaking like a leaf. “Don’t come any closer,” he says, his high-pitched voice trembling with the force of his fear. Around us, the fight rages on. “You’re all the same, just a bunch of freaks.” I shrug. “Come on, dude. We both know I could have killed you by now. But I’m not here to fight you. We just want justice. Look around you and you’ll see the real killers, the real freaks. Turn your gun on them, and I’ll do the same.” He frowns. “Fight with you?” “With me, next to me, behind me, whatever. What’s your name, kid?” He swallows noisily, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “Ethan.” I nod. “Okay, Ethan, I’m Dax. You got a girl, Ethan?” Ethan lowers the gun. “Yeah… I mean, kind of. She doesn’t really know I like her.” I smile. “Been there, man, done that. I got a girl too, back home. I kind of told her I loved her a few days ago.”
Ethan’s eyebrows shot up. “Whoa, that’s huge.” “Right? Big stuff. Plus, I promised her I’d try to make it back alive. The way I see it, I stand a better chance of that if we can try to fight together, even if it’s just for today. What do you think? Let’s end this shit so we can get home. You have a girl to win over, and I’d rather not piss mine off by coming home in a body bag.” Ethan nods. “Yeah. Yeah, okay, sure.” My hand grasps his shoulder just as a flying metal disc comes whizzing at his head. He cries out as I take him to the ground, just barely saving him from being decapitated. I’m not quite as lucky. The metal disc slices into my cheek as it flies by, laying it open. Pain explodes along the left side of my face, leaving a trail of fire that goes from my jaw to just beneath my eye. Another inch and I’d be sporting a falsie like Blythe. Behind Ethan, one of the Rejects has some sort of makeshift gun mounted on his shoulder. It’s the size of a small cannon, and it is shooting another disc at me. Dropping for cover and avoiding another gash, I grab Ethan’s shoulder again. “You good?” He stares at me with wide eyes and nods. “Yeah.” “Cool. Stay down while I kill this dickhead.” This time when he fires at me, I’m ready. The pistons in my leg joints fire rapidly and I jump, my boot connecting with the disc and kicking it back the way it came. I give Ethan a hand up as the Reject’s head slides from his shoulders, taken off by his own disc. “Can dish it out but can’t take it,” I grumble as I help Ethan to his feet. He smiles at me appreciatively. “You saved my life, man. Thanks.” “No need to thank me. Now, let’s go save some others.”

Title: The Bionics
Series: The Bionics # 1
Pages: 96 pages
ISBN: 1940534313
ASIN: B00F3T8T3S

About The Bionics Series:
The year is 4010. Nuclear war and the wasteful nature of humans have all but destroyed the United States. A new government regime rules the day with strict laws, rationed food, and careful control. When those injured in the nuclear blasts that rocked many of the nations largest cities are offered another chance by the Restoration Project, how could they refuse?
Little do they know that the robotic additions to their body will paint targets on their backs once the government decides that they are dangerous. At the forefront of the resistance is a girl with a bionic eye, Blythe Sol, who wants nothing more than to be a normal girl. Blythe has yet to realize that normal will never exist again for her, or anyone else.
About The Bionics, Book 1:
All I ever wanted was to be a normal girl. I had dreams of joining the ranks of the Military Police and making my family proud. But the nuclear war that laid waste to our country destroyed any hope I had of being normal ever again. They took everything away from me, including my humanity. I am now half-human, half-machine, part of the never-ending freak show that is the Restoration Project.
They hate what they created and they fear us for being powerful.
And so they hunt us, destroying our lives so that they can bury what they built. What they don’t know is this: there is a Resistance out there and The Bionics aren’t going down without a fight.

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Title: Titanium
Series: The Bionics # 2
Pages: 153 pages
ISBN: 1482577968
ASIN: B00F3JHEU2

We stand on the brink of a double rescue mission, a plan so foolhardy that even our bravest men are quaking inside with fear. Storm the capitol, free the prisoners, don’t get killed. It seems like a suicide mission, but not a single one of us has anything to lose.
In my past life, I was a scoundrel; a drug peddling street thug who cared nothing for anyone because I had no one to care for me. The nuclear blasts of 4006 reminded me of the value of life, and a girl with the saddest eyes I’ve ever gazed into gave me someone to care for. Now, as we embark on our most dangerous enterprise, I can only hope that we make it out alive and that those we have lost can be recovered.
Foolishness … fear … hope … These are the elements that threw our revolution into motion. As the momentum of the Resistance continues to build, we can only pray that hope continues grow larger than our fear.

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Title: Secrets
Series: The Bionics # 3
Pages: 152 pages
ISBN: 1940534348
ASIN: B00FFH0EAE

Before The Resistance, my life was one of privilege and comfort. Before The Resistance, mine was a mindset of naiveté and blind trust in a broken and corrupt government. Before The Resistance, I’d never stood up or fought for anything in my life.
Now, there is everything to fight for and everything to lose. All for a glimmer of hope in our future. It may seem a small thing but with the smallest bit of hope, men have risen against their oppressors with fists raised, even when they knew they stared into the face of death.
Now that I have found something to fight for, I can only hope that my past will not become a roadblock to my future and that the secrets I’ve kept from those whose trust I’ve gained will not come back to ruin the new life I’ve made. If they do, I fear that I will not only lose my place as part of the Resistance, but the heart of the girl I am slowly coming to love.

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Title: Spark
Series: The Bionics # 4
Pages: 160 pages
ISBN: 1940534437
ASIN: B00HZCQJ4M

Most nineteen-year-old girls are thinking about college, stretching the wings of newfound adulthood, and boys. Well, I’ll probably never go to college, and all my dreams of the future are gone. I’ve been adult for much longer than I should have been, and my girlhood was stolen the minute the North Koreans dropped their nukes over the United States. As for boys … well, that’s pretty much out of the question now. My love life is too messy to even talk about.
I have nothing.
Except, maybe, my cause—my mission—The Resistance. It is the hope I have to cling to. I am counting on it to pave the way to my future. As things heat up and the terrorist sect known as The Rejects make themselves known opponents of society in this war, the choice to be on the side of good is harder than ever. My friends are broken; Olivia is a shell of her former self, and Jenica is barely hanging on. Dax and Gage … well, we’re not talking about my love life, remember?
The Rejects, the government, President Drummond… they are pressing in on us from all sides, and the weight is tremendous. Still, when given the choice to crumble or stand, I’d rather stand. Times are dark, but we are here, a rebellion, a whisper in the dark, a spark that lights the flames of change.

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Ever since she first read books like Chronicles of Narnia or Goosebumps, Alicia has been a lover of mind-bending fiction. Wherever imagination takes her, she is more than happy to call that place her home. With seven Fantasy and Science Fiction titles under her belt, Alicia strives to write multicultural characters and stories that touch the heart. V-Card is her first Contemporary Romance.
The mother of three and wife to an Army sergeant, she loves chocolate, coffee, and of course good books. When not writing, you can usually find her with her nose in a book, shopping for shoes and fabulous jewelry, or spending time with her loving family.