Prairie Fox Reads

    Review: The Blue Hour Paula Hawkins Mariner Books, 2025 (Paperback edition) 320 pages Disclaimer: A softcover advance reader copy (ARC) was provided for the purposes of this review. All opinions expressed are independent and reflect an objective assessment of the work as presented in the advance edition.   Overview The Blue Hour is Paula Hawkins’s latest work of psychological suspense, arriving in paperback via Mariner Books following its October 2024 hardcover debut. Set on Eris, a remote Scottish island accessible to the mainland for only twelve hours each day, the novel centers on the decades-old disappearance of Julian Chapman—the notoriously unfaithful husband of celebrated artist Vanessa Chapman—and a present-day discovery that draws three new figures into the orbit of that unresolved mystery. The book’s marketing positions it squarely within the tradition of Shirley Jackson and Patricia Highsmith, invoking themes of ambition, power, gender, and the instability...

  Book Review:   8 Keys to Healing, Managing, and Preventing Burnout   by Morgan Johnson Rating:   ★★★★☆ (4.25 out of 5 stars) Disclaimer: I was given a free copy of the book from the publisher.   This provision has in no way affected the content, objectivity, or critical analysis of this review. Publication and Context Title:   8 Keys to Healing, Managing, and Preventing Burnout Author:   Morgan Johnson Foreword:   Babette Rothschild Publication Date:   September 30, 2025 Publisher:   W. W. Norton & Company Page Count:   240 pages Format:   Paperback (ISBN: 9781324053880) Genres:   Self Help / Psychology / Nonfiction Target Audience:   Professionals, caregivers, activists, and anyone experiencing chronic stress who feels alienated by mainstream “toxic positivity” and superficial self-care culture. Contextual Backdrop: Published in the fall of 2025, this book arrived during an ongoing cultural reckoning regarding ...

  Young Enough to Be Underestimated: A Review of Killer Teens by Jack Steen The Asylum Confession Files #9 | Horror and Thriller | 242 pages | First published September 8, 2025 Rating: ★★★★☆ Jack Steen returns to the asylum’s death ward in Killer Teens , the ninth installment in The Asylum Confession Files . This volume focuses on crimes committed during adolescence, presenting four deathbed confessions involving teenage killers. The familiar arrangement remains unchanged. Patients arrive on Steen’s ward alive, but none leave that way. Before they die, however, Steen asks them for the stories they never told investigators, courts, families, or the public. In exchange for a complete confession, he helps make their final moments less painful. Steen is the ward’s night nurse and the last face many of these patients will see. They call him their Angel of Death. He knows them as serial killers, mass murderers, sexual predators, and other violent offenders. His task is to care for them,...